


Plague in Ankh-Morpork

by Dats_der_bunny



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Developing Relationship, Gen, M/M, Pining, Plague, Polyamory Negotiations, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:07:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 23,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25627969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dats_der_bunny/pseuds/Dats_der_bunny
Summary: This is VERY loosely based on the current pandemic, although I've deliberately tried not to make it too similar. I started thinking about how Vetinari would deal with the situation and it went from there really! It's also slightly inspired by The Last Sentence, which I absolutely love (check it out if you haven't already)!This is set in the winter after Monstrous Regiment (so between Night Watch and Thud!). Remixes and translations are very welcome, if you'd like to play with a different outcome just drop me a comment first and then go for it! I'd love to see other ideas, just make sure you link any of my work back to me :)Update (13/12/20) I am working on the last two chapters, I promise, and I will finish it one day! But it is on a cliffhanger right now, so if you're bothered by that then don't start it just yet because I don't know when I'll be able to finish it!
Relationships: Havelock Vetinari & Samuel Vimes, Havelock Vetinari/Samuel Vimes, Sybil Ramkin/Samuel Vimes
Comments: 114
Kudos: 81





	1. Basic bodingness is bad enough.

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Last Sentence](https://archiveofourown.org/works/539216) by [oneinspats](https://archiveofourown.org/users/oneinspats/pseuds/oneinspats). 



> First attempt at writing something with an actual plot! Please leave feedback, I haven't entirely decided where I'm going with this (although I do have a few ideas) - let me know if you have suggestions!
> 
> I wanted to write about Vetinari and Vimes actively working together, with mutual respect and eventually friendship (if not more) gradually developing as a result.

Lord Vetinari sighed to himself. It was not an indulgence he permitted himself often, but the situation in Sto Helit was far worse than he’d anticipated. He made a few notes and dismissed the night clerk, then he went to the window. He knew that it would only be a matter of time before the people of Ankh-Morpork started to succumb to the disease, with the number of trade routes that started and ended in the city and their reliance on imported food, coal and just about everything else it takes to keep a city alive.

He also knew that there was little chance of getting his usual four hours of sleep tonight. In fact, he suspected that his sleep would have to suffer for a very long time indeed.

—

‘Ladies and gentlemen.’ Lord Vetinari addressed the group clustered around the big table in the Rats’ Chamber. He didn’t raise his voice over the chatter, he just left a little pause with the certainty that his audience would have stopped speaking by the time he was ready to resume.

Commander Vimes sat at the opposite end of the table to the Patrician. He liked to sit there as often as he could, because it meant that Vetinari, though tall, would have to crane his neck ever so slightly to look at him over the axe embedded deeply in the table. In fact, he usually made a point of slouching ever so slightly. Today, however, he took little pleasure in his favourite seat. He’d found things out, as Watchmen do, and he was worried.

‘I have called you here today to address the rumours about a new plague that seems to have taken hold of several cities nearby. I am very sorry to say that the plague does, in fact, exist and seems to be moving across the Sto Plains with alacrity.’

There was a collective intake of breath. Not quite a gasp, because a gasp implies surprise. There was just that palpable building of tension in the room.

‘Thus far,’ he continued, ‘The news is running ahead of the disease thanks to the Clacks; however, it is only a matter of time before we start to see the first cases here. Trade with other cities is unavoidable. There are a few problems starting to develop which could so easily escalate if they are not nipped in the bud.’ He had a harsh way of articulating the consonants in the phrase “nipped in the bud” that actually made a few people jump.

His gaze traversed the silent room and at last fell on the head of the Guild of Merchants and Traders, who seemed to be trying to retreat into the collar of his shirt.

Vetinari smiled amiably. ‘While I wouldn’t dream of interfering with Guild business,’ he began, leaving another pause for all the sudden little coughs and even a couple of suppressed sniggers from the braver Guild leaders to die down again, ‘I suspect that panic will soon set in. I would like some reassurance that there will be no profiteering, and that the Guild will be doing everything in its power to prevent the hoarding of food and other essential resources. According to my informants in the other afflicted cities, there have been some rather extreme cases of hoarding, which will not be repeated here.’

Vimes looked on with some sympathy as the little man opened his mouth to speak, then wisely closed it again and just nodded very enthusiastically. Vimes didn’t even know the man’s name, since the Guild had a new leader so often that they might as well have a revolving office door installed. 

Vetinari smiled again. ‘Capital! I’m so glad that we are in agreement. My clerks have prepared some more precise figures, if you would be so kind as to liaise with Drumknott after the meeting.’ He shuffled some papers. ‘Now then, what else was there?’ he said, as the icy blue eyes scanned the room for their next victim. ‘Ah, Mr Boggis.’ he said, as if completely surprised to see him there at all.

The thief closed his eyes briefly. ‘My lord?’ he said, once a charming grin was safely set on his face once more.

‘I think, given the current situation, that it would be remiss of me not to review the licensed theft quota we have agreed for this quarter?’

Boggis swallowed. ‘Yes, my lord?’ he said, shakily.

‘In order to alleviate some of the pressures on the city’s population, might I suggest a temporary reduction of, say, ten percent?’

‘T—ten?’ He took a deep breath as the blue eyes narrowed. ‘We will, of course, do our bit to help in the crisis,’ he said, as if reciting the words from a script. ‘However, might I humbly ask for financial compensation for our members?’

Vimes suddenly found that he had a newfound respect for Mr Boggis of the Thieves’ Guild. Respect for his boldness, of course, not for his wisdom and self-preservation.

Vetinari let the silence that followed wander leisurely into the realms of the uncomfortable, before flashing Boggis a reptilian smile. ‘Of course, Mr Boggis, you’re quite right. Your members must, of course, be paid whatever compensation you feel is appropriate.’

Boggis brightened up.

‘Happily, Mr Boggis,’ Vetinari continued, ‘Mr Drumknott here has a summary of the outstanding taxes owed by the Thieves’ Guild. I am no accountant, but the figures do make for interesting reading nevertheless. I am certain that you will be able to put the back taxes to good use.’

It was little moments like this, watching Boggis’s face fall as realisation dawned, and his eyes bulging as he read through the papers Drumknott had handed him, that made Sam Vimes’s day so much brighter.

—

One of the fundamental laws of the universe is that after a very long and very tedious meeting, when everyone else is absolutely desperate for it to come to an end, one person will inevitably take “Any other business?” as an exquisitely handwritten, gold-edged invitation to ask a question that will prolong the meeting by at least another fifteen minutes.

Today, this person was Mr Slant.

Vimes wasn’t surprised. It usually was Mr Slant. He listened to the relentless droning of the rasping, sand-blasted voice, letting his mind wander as it became clear that this was going to be a monologue rather than a dialogue. Mr Slant had a way of asking questions that bordered on the unintelligible, circling back and changing direction so often that it wasn’t at all clear what the question, in fact, was. Perhaps it was a lawyer thing. Or perhaps, Vimes reflected, Mr Slant just had a stick so far up his arse that you could see the splinters when he yawned.

Actually, Mr Slant didn’t yawn; or at least not since his death in any case; although if he did, you’d be more likely to see a fly escaping his mouth.

He caught Mossy Lawn’s eye, keeping his face carefully blank. Lawn was new to these meetings; the paint was practically still drying at the Lady Sybil Free Hospital at the corner of Goose Gate, although it had come on a long way while Vimes had been in Borogravia and it was already taking in its first patients. Not a moment too soon, fortunately.

Vimes gave Lawn a look which contained the distilled essence of rolled eyes, while somehow keeping his face completely immobile.

The corner of Lawn’s mouth twitched almost imperceptibly, before he turned back to face Slant with a polite, enquiring expression.

—

‘Commander Vimes?’ called the Patrician, as the others began to file out of the room.

Damn, he thought. He had just started to think that he had got off quite lightly this time. ‘Sir?’ he said, in his talking-to-Vetinari voice.

‘Just keep the lid on things, will you?’ said Vetinari, without looking up from the papers in front of him.

Vimes nodded, then saluted. ‘Sir,’ he replied. Nothing more needed to be said.

—

Vetinari began his journey to the attic. It was not a straightforward process. It took no small amount of skipping and dancing and balancing to reach the locked door, behind which he found Leonard da Quirm. That is to say, he found an apparition dressed in very heavy protective gear that he assumed to be Leonard da Quirm, although his thoughts on the matter were quite limited as he devoted most of his attention to ducking behind a workbench.

Once the noise had died down and all shrapnel was safely embedded in the walls, ceiling, floor and furniture, he gingerly raised his head over the bench.

Leonard took off his home-made helmet. ‘Ah, my lord. What can I do for you?’ he asked, as if fragments of his kettle had not just whistled over his head and begun to smoulder behind him.

Vetinari took a moment to gather his thoughts again. ‘Tell me, Leonard,’ he said, at last, ‘Have you ever designed any kind of apparatus to give artificial assistance with breathing?’

‘Oh, yes, my lord, several, as an intellectual exercise of course. Did you have anything particular in mind?’

Vetinari offered a silent prayer to whatever deity would claim responsibility for Leonard. [1]

The phrase “intellectual exercise” invariably meant very detailed sketches; often with a list of numbered parts, assuming that his mind hadn’t wandered onto the task of designing a more efficient pencil or a hands-free device for brushing his teeth.

‘There is a new plague sweeping across the Plains, it seems. It primarily has respiratory symptoms, from what I have been able to gather so far.’

Leonard nodded solemnly. To him, the outside world and all it entailed was something that happened to other people, for the most part. There were occasions where he had ventured out in recent years, but he found that the world was full of people who would try to use his genius for unthinkably malicious purposes, so he much preferred to remain in the attic of the Patrician’s Palace.

‘I’ll have a detailed report of the symptoms sent up to you,’ Vetinari continued.

‘Of course, my lord, I am sure that I will be able to adapt some of my existing designs.’

‘Thank you.’

As Lord Vetinari turned to leave, Leonard called out to him.

‘Yes?’

‘I do have something else which may be of interest to you. It is an idea that I had forgotten about for years, but… Oh dear, it must be here somewhere.’

Vetinari didn’t allow his expression of polite enquiry so much as flicker as Leonard rummaged in the piles of paper, but he mentally braced himself for an exploding teapot, or perhaps a mechanical frog.

‘Ah, here it is!’ He handed Vetinari a wad of papers, blessedly free of drawings of any kind, instead full of dense notes and data tables.

Vetinari scanned the page. His eyes widened. ‘You are sure about this?’

Leonard nodded. ‘The figures on the first pages are less reliable, but you will find more detailed data on the later pages. It really is quite promising.’

Vetinari leafed through the papers. ‘Indeed, it is.’ He crossed the room and whistled into Leonard’s speaking tube to the servants’ quarters. ‘Please inform Doctor Lawn that he has an appointment with me in the Oblong Office at his earliest convenience.’

[1] There are none. The gods don’t want anything to do with Leonard da Quirm, they’re still sulking about the events of The Last Hero. Because no god came forward to claim the prayer, it flew around the city causing several minor inconveniences, such as leaving privy seats up and tangling boot laces. It finally earthed itself on one of the Bursar’s dried frog pills. It was an eventful afternoon for the faculty of Unseen University.


	2. Parallel-processing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam Vimes thinks about stuff. That's kind of it, really. Well, not quite, but you'll see what I mean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ye gods, that took longer than I expected. I'd worked out the beginning and end of the chapter but had trouble joining the dots. PLEASE leave feedback, I'm still really new to this and I'm never 100% happy with how it turns out!
> 
> I've decided to put the emphasis on the relationships instead of too much detail on the plague, I don't want it to be political/insensitive. Hope the balance is right and I'm not glossing over too many details.

A tiny part of Vimes was a little relieved when the first people started to get sick, although he’d never say so. It had been almost unbearable, watching and waiting as the fear took hold and people gradually became warier of one another, wondering whether the plague was already in the city, hidden behind closed doors.

He reflected, not for the first time, that at least when a dragon was burning the city down, life was simple. Even if it did disappear every so often, it was still a bloody great dragon when it did turn up again. You know where you stand with a bloody great dragon.

Even the Gonne was preferable. They might be able to hide the weapon and melt back into the crowd again, but sniffing criminals out was part of being a copper. This time, the criminal was truly invisible. It left plenty of clues, but chasing it wouldn’t do any good. You might just end up catching it.

Ha. Perhaps it isn’t so different from the old days after all, Vimes thought, bitterly.

He brought his mind back to the present. He usually tried to avoid thinking too deeply when he was in the anteroom of the Oblong Office, he couldn’t quite rely on his brain to operate properly after listening to that damned clock for any length of time. But his mind kept trying to pivot back to his conversation with Sybil earlier that day, so he allowed it to wander this time.

He could hear voices from the office but couldn’t make out what was being said. Recently, Vetinari seemed to have stopped making people wait for appointments purely for the sake of intimidating them (or in Vimes’s case, for the sake of irritating him), which Vimes thought was the scariest thing of all. He felt a pang of longing for things to go back to normal.

Thankfully, Vetinari had also suspended Watch committee meetings for the foreseeable future. Swings and roundabouts, Vimes thought, as he watched Drumknott usher Mustrum Ridcully and Ponder Stibbons out of the office. Vimes stood up and gave them a nod, then made his way to his usual spot in front of Vetinari’s desk.

‘Ah, Commander,’ said Vetinari, not looking up from his papers. He was still making a few notes from the last meeting. ‘I won’t keep you long, there are just a few matters to discuss.’

‘Sir,’ said Vimes. It was usually a safe enough response.

Vetinari put down his pen and regarded Vimes for a moment. ‘Now then, let’s see…’

While Ponder Stibbons was the Head of Inadvisably Applied Magic, Sam Vimes was the Head of Inadvisably Applied Parallel-Processing [2]. He was a master. And at the very top of the list of inappropriate conversations in which to parallel-process was any meeting involving the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork in any way.

Vetinari watched the glassy expression with increasing fascination. Sybil had mentioned to him that Vimes could do this, but he had never seen it in person before. Experimentally, he tried the Raised Eyebrow™. Well, he hadn’t really expected it to work, Vimes wasn’t even looking directly at him.

He was fairly confident that just leaving a longer silence would do the trick, but it had already been a long day and even Lord Vetinari needed a little joke here and there.

‘…And we believe that the undead are immune to the disease, since the worst has, arguably, already happened, as it were. You will therefore be pleased to hear that I have found twenty vampire recruits for the Watch.’

‘Sir,’ he replied, automatically.

Vetinari watched as rusty little wheels began to turn, then the bigger wheels jolted into action, finally triggering a response.

‘What?! Vampires?’ He glanced down at Vetinari’s amused expression and stiffened. ‘Sorry, sir,’ he mumbled.

Vetinari left a tiny pause. ‘That’s quite alright, Commander. I’m sure you have a lot on your mind.’ There was just a hint of warning in his voice. ‘There was just one last thing, however. I wonder if you might be so kind as to allow the city the use of any suitable vacant properties you have? We will need to prepare additional hospitals and, eventually, morgues.’

Vimes shrugged. He had been thinking along the same lines himself recently. ‘Sybil will have a better idea of which ones will be any good to you I expect, I haven’t even visited some of them. You’re welcome to use any of them as far as I’m concerned.’ He didn’t push his luck by adding: why stop at the vacant properties? Why not use the Assassins’ Guild too? No, please, I insist. I could do with a laugh.

‘So kind, I’ll get a message to Lady Sybil. I do hope she is well?’ Vetinari enquired.

Vimes closed his eyes. He usually had a long and varied line of bland, stock answers on the tip of his tongue, but just now they had deserted him, leaving only complete honesty in their wake.

‘I’ve tried to convince her to take Young Sam to the countryside.’ His voice was steady and controlled, but sounded brittle. ‘She won’t leave the city. I can’t bear the thought of…’ His voice trailed off as he searched for the words to describe the unthinkable.

‘Of bringing the disease home to them?’ Vetinari finished for him, slowly and carefully.

Vimes nodded, his face grey.

The Patrician steepled his fingers under his chin and weighed up his options. Then he placed both hands flat on the desk.

‘Commander Vimes, I believe that your men will need additional assistance as the plague progresses, so as of today I am assigning a significant proportion of the Palace Guard to the City Watch. I am therefore putting you, personally, in charge of my security for the duration of this crisis. You may return home to collect your belongings but you will subsequently stay in one of the rooms at the Palace.’

Momentarily stunned, Vimes broke the habit of a lifetime and met Vetinari’s gaze. For the first time, he could see the weight of a million lives on his shoulders. Vimes was no stranger to heavy burdens himself, but the life-or-death decisions he had to make were typically impulsive, not made in cold blood.

Yet here Vetinari was, protecting Vimes and his family. He instinctively wanted to resist and fight the order, but this wasn’t a battle with the personal on one side and the important on the other.

Vetinari went on, ‘You will continue to command the City Watch from Pseudopolis Yard and work with your men to keep the peace in the city, although you will need to delegate responsibilities to your senior officers in order to take up your duties here.’

The Patrician waited for a while, then he cleared his throat. Vimes belatedly realised that he must have been staring for some time. He shifted his weight and found the point on the wall one foot above and six inches to the left of Vetinari’s head. He saluted, then added, ‘Sir,’ for good measure.

‘Was that a “Yes, sir” or a “No, sir”?’ Vetinari asked.

Against his better judgement, Vimes replied, ‘It was a “Thank you, sir”.’

Lord Vetinari, the master of the awkward silence, blinked. For once he was at a loss, very few people ever _thanked_ him. Vimes opened his mouth to fill the silence, but Vetinari managed to gather his thoughts and raised a hand. ‘I’m certain you have much to organise, Vimes. Don’t let me detain you.’

As he reached the door, Vimes knew that what he was about to say was a bad idea, but he was feeling drunk on raw emotion and was powerless to stop himself. ‘But you’re already going to detain me, sir. Isn’t that the whole point?’

‘Yes, you’re quite right, Vimes. Very funny.’ he said wearily, although there was a slight glint in his eye, if you knew where to look. He added, ‘Do give my love to Sybil. Be sure to tell her that I ordered you to stay here.’

Vimes didn’t turn around, he just nodded, before swinging open the door and striding out into the corridor.

Vetinari listened to distant doors open and close; and footsteps fade away on the lower floors. He let out a breath he hadn’t noticed that he’d been holding. He hadn’t been entirely sure what reaction to expect from Vimes, but he certainly wasn’t prepared for gratitude. Punching the wall outside, certainly. That would almost have been preferable. _Almost._

_  
_

2\. See The Fifth Elephant for details on parallel-processing.


	3. The Bedroom Floor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we consider the training of Dark Clerks, the cost of plastering and Lord Vetinari's education. Among other things...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, look, someone left another chapter lying around... *Sidles away like Nobby Nobbs.*

Vetinari therefore wasn’t surprised at all when he heard the distant, dull thud later that evening. He briefly toyed with the idea of sending a clerk to deal with it, but decided against it. He finished the sentence he was writing and stood up, picked up his cane and made his way down the corridor.

The dark clerks; who did not, of course, exist; each had a highly specialised skillset and impeccable training. Regrettably, dealing-with-Vimes training was not yet included. A smile flashed across his face at the thought of his clerks sitting at rows of little schoolroom desks in front of a blackboard, upon which phrases such as “going spare” and “totally librarian poo” were neatly written.

Smile inhumed and safely hidden away, he knocked on the door. The lack of response was equally unsurprising, so he gently opened it. He found Vimes sitting on the floor at the other end of the room, his back against the wall and his head in his hands. Vetinari scanned the room until he found the hole in the wall by the door. He traced his fingers over it briefly, reflecting that once upon a time, Vimes did this so often and with such ferocity that he had negotiated a long-term standing contract with the Guild of Plasterers because the one-off fees were getting so high. He crossed the room to stand in front of Vimes.

Lord Vetinari’s friendship with Lady Sybil Vimes was common knowledge in the city. At least, the knowledge was certainly common to those who lived in the more select areas of Ankh. It probably wasn't all that interesting to your average inhabitant of, say, The Shades. However, it would surprise even those more familiar with the Patrician’s idiosyncratic tendencies to know that he also had a rather soft spot for Sam Vimes. 

Most surprised of all would be Sam Vimes himself. He lifted his head, then groaned when he saw who was opposite him and covered his face with his hands again. He had barely even registered the footsteps since the blood was still roaring in his ears, but he really should have noticed the clicking of the cane.

He let his hands slide down his face and onto the floor. ‘If you’re about to say something sensible, don’t bother, it’s not been a good night.’ Then he remembered himself and added ‘Sir.’

‘Sybil didn’t take the news well?’

Vimes raised his head again to look up at Vetinari, wrestling with his instinctive sarcastic response. In the end, he just shook his head. ‘The opposite, actually, she hardly said a word.’

‘Ah,’ said Vetinari, who didn’t add ‘And that made you feel even guiltier, didn’t it?’. Instead, he leaned heavily on his cane as he lowered himself to sit on the floor next to Vimes, leaving a carefully calculated distance between them. ‘I was merely going to offer to take a look at that hand, Commander,’ he said, exuding far more elegance than any man in his fifties had any right to while sitting cross-legged on the floor.

Vimes glanced down at the bloody mess, then he closed his eyes and let his head roll back against the wall, looking up at the ceiling. ‘Ha, you’re a doctor as well, are you?’

‘Well, if you must know, I am, actually.’

Vimes opened his eyes again and frowned. ‘Really, sir?’

The Patrician nodded. ‘Indeed. Doctor of Medicine and Applied Pathology. Among other things.’ Well, he thought, Vimes obviously wanted to talk, and most emphatically wanted to _not_ talk about Sybil. He didn’t typically like people to know exactly what qualifications he had gained at the Assassins’ Guild, but the pair of them were hardly of the small talk persuasion, and it was as good a topic as any.

Vimes narrowed his eyes. ‘Such as?’

‘Well, if you’d like the full list, Doctor of Music, Doctor of God Studies, Master Assassin, Master of Political Expediency, Master of Alchemical Science, Member of the Institute of Dance and Deportment, Bachelor of the Science of Inhumation and,’ here he gave Vimes a little smile, ‘I have a Diploma in Physical Education.’ [3]

Vimes’s jaw actually dropped. ‘ _Physical Education_?’

Vetinari smiled to himself. ‘Somebody, it seems, enrolled me in the programme as a joke. I have always assumed that it was Downey, he was certainly rather put out when I attended the classes and even more so when I completed the course.’ [4]

Vimes raised both eyebrows. ‘ _Lord Downey_?’

Vetinari nodded and smiled. ‘Indeed. Although I’d appreciate it if this didn’t go any further.’

Vimes nodded and gave a little mock-salute. Fortunately, he still had the self-preservation instincts not to say something along the lines of “What happens on the floor of the bedroom stays on the floor of the bedroom” or similar, which was a shame because it was such a good line.

Although, now that he thought about it, he could almost certainly get away with saying something like that with very few consequences. Vetinari had to be the most lenient and tolerant tyrant in the history of the world. He’d probably have just raised his hand to his mouth very quickly or perhaps turned away.

He started to wonder what it would take to make the Patrician laugh. Not a supressed chuckle, or a smile hidden behind a hand, but a genuine laugh.

He started to wonder why he was wondering about that.

He stopped wondering about that.

Then he cursed himself for letting silence fall between them.

So did Vetinari. He loathed moments like this, so it was just as well that they were so rare. He was not so callous as to default back to being _The Patrician_ , but he was too scared to be Havelock instead. Havelock was vulnerable. Havelock had weaknesses and flaws. Havelock could not always be trusted to remain in control.

And Havelock had a heart, and hearts could be broken. And that, he vowed, would never happen again.

He had learned to treat Havelock and the Patrician as two different people, for the sake of his own sanity. Of course, neither were anything more than names, and “Havelock” didn’t even feel all that personal to him, since it was used so often by the likes of Lord Rust and only ever when they wanted something from him.

He steeled himself. ‘For what it’s worth, Commander, I’m sorry.’ he said, looking away from Vimes and apparently studying the rug in the middle of the room in some detail.

‘You’re sorry, sir? Why?’ asked Vimes, suddenly feeling inexplicably panicky.

Vetinari took a deep breath. ‘There was that time-travelling business back in May, and you only returned from spending months away in Borogravia few weeks ago.’ He shifted almost imperceptibly, he just didn’t have the vocabulary for this kind of conversation, despite all of his education. ‘I am… aware that you could have retired when you married Lady Sybil,’ he noted the way Vimes stiffened but he carried on, ‘Both of you have sacrificed a great deal for the city and are continuing to do so now. I am grateful, Commander.’ 

Well, thought Vetinari, here lies the worst expression of gratitude that mankind has ever had the misfortune to encounter. Ashes to ashes…

And then Sam Vimes surprised him again.

‘You can call me Sam, sir. If you want to, that is.’

After a moment’s hesitation, he said, ‘Then I think we’d better dispense with the “sirs”, don’t you? Outside the office, that is.’

Vimes smirked.

Vetinari extended his hand to Vimes. ‘Havelock,’ he said.

Vimes took the proffered hand and shook it, with a nod.

Then Vetinari stood up, once again far more gracefully than the laws of physics (and ageing) should allow, and left the room without another word.

Well then, Vimes thought, he never did look at my hand in the end.

Then he thought: _Havelock_. Bugger.

3\. This is completely true, according to the _Discworld’s Assassins’ Guild Yearbook and Diary 2000_ (via Wikipedia).

4\. I made that bit up though. I reckon this is just as good an explanation as any and is certainly true in this particular trouser leg of time.


	4. The role of coffee in dealing with Havelock Vetinari

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vimes is feeling very introspective in this chapter, and who am I to argue?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise there's a bit of actual plot on the way very soon! I actually finished this one much later than I originally planned because I got distracted by some ideas I had for later chapters.

Vimes woke at around 7am the next morning and swore. After nearly thirty years of night shifts, he knew that he would never get used to this backwards way of sleeping during the hours of darkness and waking up in the morning. Besides, there was something about being greeted by sunshine and singing birds (which were somewhat unlikely though not completely unheard of in Ankh-Morpork) that affronted him. It just set you up with such unrealistic expectations for the rest of the day.

He sighed and dragged himself out of bed to set about making himself look reasonably presentable. The room was chilly, the big window panes were leeching heat from the room which suited Vimes just fine, as did the lack of a butler. Vimes respected and actually rather liked Willikins, but he was prepared to savour shaving himself without catching looks of disapproval in the mirror. He was also glad that he’d left Scoone Avenue in such a hurry, he’d been able to pick up his favourite (and therefore scruffiest) clothes and his precious dented breastplate. Sybil would surely notice and have some better clothes sent to the Palace soon enough. But for now, he basked in the novelty, before wandering down the corridor in search of breakfast. 

He didn’t know much about the layout of the Palace. Very few people did, of course, but when the Patrician had been poisoned around three years ago, he’d been shown the little dining room on the fifth floor that Vetinari used when he didn’t take his meals in his office. Vimes hoped that the Patrician would already be at work by 7am. It wouldn’t be surprising, and it was far too early in the morning to deal with Havelock Vetinari. 

When he found Vetinari at the table with a copy of The Times and a cup of tea, he bore up quite well. He didn’t swear or even roll his eyes. 

‘Ah, good morning Commander,’ said Vetinari cheerfully, without looking up from the paper. 

Well, thought Vimes, at least that answers the Havelock/Sir question that had been forming. ‘Morning, sir,’ he said. He was prepared to admit, begrudgingly, that it might be morning, but the suggestion that it might be good was flying in the face of all the evidence. 

Vetinari folded up the paper and glanced at the clock. ‘Oh dear, is that the time? I should really be getting back to the office,’ he said, standing up. He gestured to the table. ‘Please do help yourself.’ 

Vimes sat down as Vetinari walked towards the door. Okay, he thought, this could have been a lot more embarrassing after the conversation we had yesterday. 

Vetinari turned around as he reached the door. ‘Oh, and by the way, I received a message from Lady Sybil about the vacant properties. She has also given me some rather strict instructions that you are to eat fresh fruit and vegetables while you are here. Bacon, I am very sorry to say, will not be acceptable.’ He smiled cheerfully, then strode down the corridor towards the office. 

Vimes groaned. He was never going to live this down. Vetinari would never bring it up again, he was almost certain, but he’d know that Vimes knew that he knew. Come to think of it, Sybil knew that Vetinari knew that Vimes knew that Vetinari knew. 

And that, Vimes decided, was too much knowing going on in a brain still deprived of coffee. 

—

Vetinari was still smiling when he sat down at his desk and got back to work. There was a soft knock on the door, and Drumknott entered, with a fresh cup of tea. 

‘Ah, thank you Drumknott,’ he said as the clerk put the cup down beside him and tidied the “out” tray. 

Drumknott paused at the door. ‘Are you quite well, my lord? You don’t usually take a break so early, you’ve only been at work since four-thirty.’ 

Vetinari smiled again. ‘I’m quite well, thank you Drumknott, I was simply relaying a message to Commander Vimes.’ 

‘Oh, I’d have done that, my lord-‘ He stopped when he caught Vetinari’s expression. ‘Oh, I see,’ he said, with a little glint in his own eye. Lord Vetinari’s sense of humour was difficult for most people to comprehend, mainly because there were so few signs that he’d found something amusing in the first place. But there were little clues.

—

It occurred to Vimes as he ate that he wasn’t entirely sure what the Patrician expected him to do all day. As far as he knew, the Palace Guard were still here as normal, so he decided to go to Pseudopolis Yard as usual and come back to the Palace for his scheduled briefing at 11am. 

He drew his cloak around him, the winter weather was already starting to pick up momentum and the wind was harsh. He let his feet take him across the Brass Bridge of their own accord. When Vimes had that particular preoccupied expression on his face, most people in the city knew well enough to move out of his way, so his thought process was almost always uninterrupted.

How can I keep my men safe? Well, he already had a few ideas about that. He’d drawn up rotas to pair human officers with officers from other species to reduce their contact with other humans, and he’d written strict instructions on the advice of Dr Lawn for officers on cell duty to minimise cross-contamination with prisoners.

In a way, however, keeping them safe from the plague itself was almost a secondary concern. What was keeping him awake at night was finding a way to stop morons from seeing an opportunity for looting and rioting, from seeing coppers as nothing more than a walking uniform with a target on their back. Of course, that wasn’t especially out of the ordinary, this was Ankh-Morpork, after all. But this time it felt different.

The other problem was that he could see the way things were going. Ankh-Morpork worked, it was true, but how close to disaster was it when you really got down to it? Vetinari had the city walking along a tightrope, which was just fine until the tightrope walker decides to glance down at the ground far below, or starts to wonder how it could be physically possible to balance like this in the first place and loses their concentration, or perhaps has the bright idea of trying to turn around so that they can walk back the way they came. It wasn’t one of the most naturally stable places on the Disc by any means, which is why Vetinari’s special brand of stability and continuity was so appealing, or rather, why it was tolerated. 

Vimes’s instinctive reaction would be to reduce the number of human officers on patrol in the first place, to have them on jail or desk duty instead, where he could look after them. But the trouble with that was that when people stopped seeing human officers on the beat, they’d start cooking up conspiracy theories. Suddenly, it starts to look like the other species in the city are doing very well out of the plague indeed. Was the plague concocted by dwarfs in some laboratory somewhere? They’re clever little buggers, I wouldn’t put it past them! Was it being spread by trolls? Everyone knows they’re unhygienic! Was it the will of Om or Blind Io or Offler or any number of other gods because they had given golems voices and let them think they are citizens of Ankh-Morpork? The priests had said that it was blasphemy all along! 

Of course, similar theories would be gently simmering away in the background already, but the opportunity to bring them out into the daylight didn’t have to be handed to them by the City Watch. How long would it be before the first idiot drags a crate into Sator Square to stand on, declaring that there was an obvious solution right under their noses? In the presence of a big crowd standing shoulder to shoulder, the disease spreading like the Great Inn-Sewer-Ants Fire. How many people would actually believe what the aforementioned idiot said? 

Too many, Vimes thought, as he reached the Watch House. 

He opened the door. The little background noises faded and expectant faces looked up at him. 

Damn.


	5. The Iron Lung

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we consider a City Watch crash course, some aspects of the history of medicine and associated etymology, and Vimes's approach to filing.

The deep wound left behind by the Glorious Revolution had been made all the deeper when it had been reopened in May, and the refreshed memory of Sergeant Keel kept resurfacing at times like these. It hurt him to see that “what do we do now, sarge?” look in their eyes, they seemed to be pleading with him to help them shoulder the burdens of being a copper, to take some of the decisions away from them. He remembered giving John Keel the same look all those years ago.

It momentarily derailed him, until years of experience took over. Take control, give them direction, don’t let them see that you’re muddling through just as much as they are. He took a deep breath. ‘Why aren’t those desks six feet apart? I know for a fact that I personally passed on the guidelines directly from the hospital. And that glass screen can’t protect the officers at the duty desk if it’s sitting on the damned floor!’ He continued barking out orders so fast that their feet wouldn’t have time to touch the ground. Once he had the hive of inefficient activity established, he beckoned to his senior officers and led the way out into the yard.

The unusual suspects, as Vimes internally liked to think of them on days where he was feeling less than charitable, filed out and stood evenly spaced apart. ‘As I’m sure you will have already heard, we are going to be joined by the Palace Guard soon enough. Now, you all know well enough by now that I have nothing but respect for the fine men entrusted with the sacred duty of protecting our Patrician.’

At this remark, Angua gave a little cough and looked away for a moment, and when she turned back again her face was even more carefully blank than before. Fred Colon’s brow began to furrow, but he moved on before the sarcasm had the chance to register.

‘ _However_ ,’ he said, more emphatically than strictly necessary, ‘They aren’t street officers yet, so we’ll need to knock ‘em into shape before we can let them loose on the general public. Detritus?’

‘Looking forward to it already, sir,’ he said, with a crisp salute.

Vimes nodded. The troll was much quicker on the uptake in the freezing weather. In the summer he would have had to take him through it step by step to make sure he understood.

‘As am I, Detritus,’ he said, with complete honesty and a big smile. ‘We’ll keep ‘em on night shifts to begin with, where can’t do much permanent damage.’ After all, he added to himself, I didn’t. Not to mention Nobby and Colon. ‘There’s nothing quite like a proper City Watch crash course.’ With emphasis on the crash. He could see out of the corner of his eye that Carrot wasn’t quite radiating his usual enthusiasm. That’s something to keep a close eye on, he thought to himself. ‘Right, then. Shifts and rotas next.’

—

Meanwhile, across the river, high above the city, the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork was balancing on one leg and counting to ten under his breath.

He was aware of a whirring noise as he made the last hop across to the threshold and unlocked the door.

‘Ah, my lord! Just in time, I have the first prototype working!’ Leonard was beaming as he beckoned Vetinari to take a closer look.

Vetinari picked his way across the floor with even more care than he had just taken to avoid the extremely creative traps in the corridors that led to the little attic room. For one thing, the flagstones outside were _almost_ guaranteed to be free of stray contact explosives.

It looked like a metal coffin. Large steel and smaller glass panels had been welded together to form a chamber around a hospital bed. There was a huge sheet of rubber stretched across the opening, with a small hole that looked about the size of the average neck. A mass of tubes protruded like tentacles.

Leonard was already chattering excitedly, buzzing around the contraption and making small adjustments. ‘The bellows here adjust the air pressure in the chamber, you see? Thus, we can mimic the action of the diaphragm drawing air into the lungs.’

Vetinari raised a hand when Leonard was forced to pause to draw breath into his own lungs. Years of experience had taught him that, while you could find out a great deal about people by allowing them to fill silences, conversations with Leonard were very different to those that took place in the Rats’ Chamber. To get anything useful out of Leonard, the conversation had to be gently steered in the right direction.

‘How is it powered?’ Vetinari asked, gently prodding at one of the rubber tubes.

‘I thought a golem should do the trick. They wouldn’t get tired, you see, so the air flow could be kept moving at a consistent rhythm.’

Vetinari’s heart sank. He should have thought of this, Leonard didn’t always have a firm grasp of what goes on in the real world. ‘Do you mean,’ he said, very carefully, ‘that we would need one golem per patient, 24/8?’

Leonard shook his head. ‘Not at all, my lord! Dear me, that would be rather inefficient. I have done some rough calculations and I believe that one golem should be able to power a bank of the devices, they could certainly manage all of the patients on a ward. I do have some ideas on how to modify the airflow where necessary; for children, for example.’

Vetinari relaxed. While the golems would, of course, need to be paid for their time, there was a major advantage in golems working for wages: the city wouldn’t need to find a large sum upfront to buy them outright. ‘And do you have a name for the contraption yet?’ He always asked. He wasn’t sure why he always asked, but there were some things that just had to be done.

‘Oh well, since it’s mostly made of iron and it is designed to aid the lungs, I like to think of it as the Machine For Artificially Expanding The Lungs Using Bellows.

Vetinari smiled. ‘Do you know, Leonard, that really doesn’t surprise me at all. I’ll get a message to Commander Vimes and have his men move it to the hospital. I have arranged for a small army of apprentices from the Street of Cunning Artificers to commence building more as soon as the design is finalised with the hospital.’

‘Thank you, my lord. I’ll keep working on it, of course.’

Vetinari nodded and headed towards the door. He paused. ‘Just out of interest, Leonard, have you thought of a name for your other… idea yet?’

Leonard had already resumed the final adjustments to the device, but he paused to consider this. ‘Not yet, my lord. Now then, let’s see… The original idea was based on cowpox and the Latatian word for “cow” is _vacca_ … No, that sounds silly…’

Vetinari looked at the ceiling for a moment. ‘ _Vacca_ ,’ he repeated. ‘Perhaps I could be so bold as to suggest that we call it a _vaccination_?’ [5]

‘Ah, a message from the Palace. How delightful,’ Vimes muttered to himself in the privacy of his office as he shuffled through the envelopes that had been handed to him on his way up the stairs. He sighed and tossed the others aside, then he opened it. He sighed again. Thoughtful of his lordship to provide my men with another distraction, he thought. He strode out into the corridor, almost running into Carrot. They both automatically jumped back and Vimes marvelled at just how quickly the habit of keeping their distance had set in.

‘Ah, Carrot. I’ve got a meeting at the Palace and I want you to come with me. His lordship has requested that we move some kind of contraption from the Palace to the hospital. Gods know what it is, all he’s said is that it’s bulky and very heavy. Is Dorfl back on duty yet?’

‘Yes, sir. He’s at Dolly Sisters.’

‘Perfect, get a message to him, will you? Tell him to meet us there.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Carrot saluted.

Even the salute didn’t look quite right today, Vimes thought as he ducked back into his office and scooped up the rest of the letters. He flicked through them and found the usual assortment of inane complaints and other valiant efforts to waste his time. Then he filed them [6] and took the stairs two at a time.

When he reached the bottom of the stairs, Carrot had braced his arm against the wall and was swaying slightly.

‘Captain?’ he said, unable to keep the panic out of his voice.

Carrot tried to straighten up as he turned to face Vimes and very slowly collapsed.

Vimes managed to overcome his instinctive reaction to rush to Carrot’s side. Non-humans only. ‘Detritus and Cheery, get him upstairs. Cheery, you know what to do. Swires? Get a message to the hospital. No, wait, not the hospital, _directly_ to Lawn.’ He turned away as Detritus lifted Carrot and lumbered towards the stairs with Cheery following closely behind. ‘And where the hell is Angua?’

‘She’ll be heading for Least Gate, Mister Vimes,’ said Colon, from behind the duty desk.

Vimes groaned. That was about as far from Pseudopolis Yard as you could get on this side of the city walls.

At that moment, because narrativium likes to keep the world neat and tidy, a blood-curdling howl echoed through the streets.

5\. I have slightly bastardized the concepts of the Iron Lung and the original cowpox/smallpox vaccinations. I know that the Iron Lung was used for polio but I think I understand the physics well enough to adapt it to the Discworld so that’s what we’re going with. If you’re not familiar with medical history, I’d recommend looking them up – they are quite interesting!

6\. If I have to explain where Vimes “filed” the letters then you clearly haven’t been paying attention 😉

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very sorry about leaving it at another cliffhanger, but the next chapter is nearly done so I promise it won't be long!


	6. The Amber Liquid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is what Tiffany Aching would call a Reckoning. There's some actual dialogue this time and everything.

Reading the report of the first fatality in The Times was unbelievably surreal.

What with one thing and another, he hadn’t made it back to the Palace all day. As he stared gloomily at the paper on his desk, Vimes realised that he’d actually been expecting some kind of last-minute reprieve. He thought: have I really been that naïve all along? Well, no. Not naïve as such. What he’d really been thinking all along was “Vetinari won’t let this happen, he’ll have had some kind of secret plan all along, he’ll sort it out. He’ll make this not be happening.”.

It was made all the worse for knowing that Captain Carrot was laying alone in a hospital bed.

The knock on the door that he’d been dreading all day came at last. He straightened up. ‘Come in, Angua.’

Her face when she entered the room was completely blank. That in itself broke Vimes’s heart even more than it would have done if she’d been crying. He gestured to the chair opposite him.

‘How is he?’ he asked, as she sat down.

‘Stable, apparently. They think it’s the plague.’

‘What? But he wasn’t even coughing!’

Angua sighed. ‘That’s what I said. They said that not everyone does, that’s how it’s spread so quickly. People don’t always know that they’ve got it at all until it’s too late.’

Ye gods, Vimes thought, he’s twenty years old. He’s built like a stevedore. Hells, the stevedores move out of his bloody way when he patrols near the Morpork docks. If even he can end up in this state, what hope is there for the rest of us?

Aloud, he said, ‘Do you need some time off?’

Angua shook her head. ‘You know what he’d say if it were the other way around.’

Vimes nodded. ‘Personal isn’t the same as important.’

Angua was staring at the floor. ‘Personal isn’t the same as important,’ she repeated, slowly.

She seemed lost in thought for a while and Vimes couldn’t think for the life of him what to say to her. What on the Disc _could_ he say to her, while his own wife and son were safe at home?

At last, she said, ‘But I’m not like him. I’m not… well, you already know that werewolves aren’t nice people, Mister Vimes.’ She paused. ‘I’m not sure that I deserve him,’ she said, although it seemed as though she was talking to herself.

And now you think you might not get the chance, Vimes thought. He wanted to say that she _did_ deserve him, that people had survived the plague in the other cities, that it wasn’t an automatic death sentence, that it would all be alright. Perhaps in another universe he did say all of that. In this universe, however, they just sat in silence for a while. 

‘I’m so sorry, Angua. Ah bugger, I don’t mean it like that… You know I’m not good with words,’ he said, in an almost-pleading tone of voice.

She gave him a little smile. ‘Neither am I, sir. Around about now, Carrot would have said something dumb that would have made us both roll our eyes.’

‘Something about lighting flamethrowers and cursing darkness?’ This earned him a laugh. ‘What can I do?’ he asked at last.

She regarded him with an unreadable expression. ‘Will you let me carry on as normal, for as long as possible?’

Vimes nodded. It was exactly what he’d do in the same situation.

When she’d gone, he stared at the newspaper for a while.

**Mr Alfred Drayman, 48, of Drayman and Sons Butchers, 12 Tenth Egg Street, Ankh-Morpork.**

Indifferent, uniform little letters all neatly lined up. Vimes vaguely remembered the man. It was a proper family business, too, so there would be a lot of mouths to feed with no income now.

Tenth Egg Street was on the outskirts of the city, on the Morpork side of the river. It was a close-knit part of town, a community that kept themselves to themselves. It was quite near Goose Gate, relatively close to the hospital. Unfortunately, it was also close enough to Quarry Lane to give people an excuse to start blaming the trolls.

Vimes’s fingers, entirely without direction from the conscious parts of his brain, found their way into the bottom drawer of his desk and wrapped around the neck of a bottle.

—

Vimes was mesmerised by the amber liquid in the bottle, his fists clenched by his sides, his knuckles white. He didn’t remember walking back from Pseudopolis Yard. He didn’t hear the footsteps in the corridor or even look up when the door flew open. He didn’t tear his gaze away from the bottle until it was whisked off the table in a swirl of black which swept across the room. He jumped out of the chair and followed the bottle to the bathroom, where he watched in horror as Lord Vetinari pulled the cork out and emptied it into the sink.

It takes time to empty half a bottle of whiskey, and the familiarity of the deep glugging sound combined with the increasingly intense malty smell turned Vimes’s stomach to lead. But the two men remained frozen in their bizarre tableau, neither moving a muscle or taking their eyes off the bottle, until the last drop fell, breaking the spell.

‘Did you think that I wouldn’t find out about this, Vimes, or did you do it because you wanted me to?’ asked Vetinari, as he slammed the bottle back down on the table. ‘If it was the latter, you have my undivided attention, congratulations!’

Vimes’s fists were still balled by his sides. He said nothing, just glared defiantly at Vetinari.

‘Did you drink any of it?’ He crossed the room in long strides, bringing him almost nose to nose with Vimes, who didn't back down.

‘I haven’t touched it,’ Vimes growled.

Vetinari regained some of his composure, but his voice lost none of its razor-sharp edge. ‘Where did you get it?’

Vimes continued to stare for a few seconds. ‘’S the one from my desk drawer,’ he murmured sullenly, deflating a little. ‘I wasn’t going to drink it, I just… needed it here.’ The words disgusted him; it was so pathetic to hear it said aloud.

Vetinari suddenly seemed to become aware of their proximity and turned away. When he spoke again, his voice was very quiet. ‘You _don’t_ need it, Vimes. You haven’t needed it for years.’ 

‘It suited you well enough for me to need it back then as I recall, when you broke down the Watch,’ he muttered, knowing even as he said it that it was a huge mistake to bring it up.

Vetinari shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘No. No, I refuse to believe that you of all people could be so short-sighted. You believe it was personal, do you?’ He spun around to face Vimes again. ‘Would you have really had me keep on the City Watch as they were? The City Watch? You know as well as I do _exactly_ what they were like. “Corruption” doesn’t even come close to describing the depravity that went on in the name of the law under Snapcase and Winder. And that’s even before we consider the Particulars!’ He spat out the word in disgust. ‘Breaking down the Watch had… unfortunate consequences for those policemen who were trying to do good, I’ll grant you, but if I thought for one second that it was heading in that direction again now, I would do the same again in a heartbeat!’

Vimes opened his mouth to speak but Vetinari held up a hand to silence him. He straightened up and turned to look out of the window, his hands clasped behind his back as if he was back in the Oblong Office.

‘I was very sorry to hear about Captain Carrot, of course. Thanks to the generosity of you and Lady Sybil, he is receiving the very best of care at the hands of Doctor Lawn at a Free Hospital. Thanks to Leonard, he will have access to a device to aid his breathing should his condition deteriorate any further. In short, Commander, he will have a far better chance than anyone in any of the other cities had. I hope this brings you some comfort.’

He turned on his heel before Vimes had a chance to speak. Before he reached the door, the Patrician turned around and fixed Vimes with a cold, distant look that he had never seen before. Vimes could see in those eyes a reflection of every insolent remark made, every order disobeyed and every diplomatic feather ruffled in his long and rocky career. A lesser man would have flinched. ‘If I ever catch you with alcohol again, I can assure you that you will no longer be the Commander of the Watch in this city. And that, frankly, will be the least of your problems, because I will certainly not be the one explaining to Lady Sybil why you have been relieved of your command.’

They held eye contact for a fraction of a second before Vetinari turned away and stalked out of the room.

Vimes closed his mouth. He was familiar with being angry with Vetinari. In fact, it was something of a default setting. He’d also been on the receiving end of Vetinari’s anger before, it was very rare but not unheard of. So why did this time feel different? For one thing, he didn’t think he’d ever heard Vetinari speak quite so much in one go, it just wasn’t his style. For another, he’d always used Vimes’s self-destruction habits to his advantage, but this time he’d actually come dangerously close to expressing concern.

Besides, in fairness to Vetinari, it was Mavis bloody Trouncer who finally pushed him over the edge into becoming a fully-fledged drunk. At least Vetinari hadn’t brought _that_ up.

He felt completely numb and empty. What on the Disc had just happened?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay. Vetinari's motivation for establishing the Thieves' Guild and winding down the Watch was clearly pragmatic. But I think there were also other influences that went far beyond pragmatism, considering the events of Night Watch. Vetinari watched John Keel defuse an attack on the Watch House without using any force, which surely must have had an effect on 17-year-old Havelock and may have inspired him to consider alternative ways of dealing with things. Perhaps I'm reading far too much into it, but this is my interpretation.
> 
> If you really don't agree then we can pretend it's a different trouser leg of time or something ;)


	7. The sock drawer?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Vimes redeems himself slightly, the Patrician has relays a message, and we consider correlation and causality. And some other stuff too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What am I doing with my life? Seriously.
> 
> Hoping this one balances out some of the intensity of the previous chapter!

Vimes sat at the breakfast table, staring into the little cup of very-fast-coffee. He briefly wondered why the Patrician had kept the coffee machine to himself, they could do with some of this stuff at the Watch House for the night shift.

After a while he could feel his whole body buzzing with the effects of the caffeine and his nervous system started to resonate. He decided that, on balance, Vetinari had made the right decision. Gods help the city if Dibbler ever got hold of this stuff.

To his horror, the door opened and Vetinari stepped into the room. Vimes stiffened. Right, he thought, how are we going to play this? Business as usual? Probably the best strategy. Can’t go far wrong with a “sir”.

‘Ah, good morning, Commander,’ said Vetinari, brightly.

Yep, business as usual, thought Vimes. It’s not as if either of us made any stupid remarks or threatened to destroy anyone’s career last night, is it?

Aloud, he just said ‘Sir.’

‘I won’t disturb you for long, I know you must have much to attend to at the Watch House now that Captain Carrot is unwell. As far as I’m concerned, the palace security measures are just a formality to allow you to stay here, you may resume your usual duties.’ said Vetinari, glancing around the room.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Vimes, woodenly. He wondered if he should have stood up and saluted, but it was a bit late for that.

‘I have had a note from Lady Sybil, she is coming to the Palace today to discuss the changes we will need to make to each of your buildings to accommodate the new equipment.’ He caught the look on Vimes’s face. ‘While maintaining a distance of at least six feet as advised, of course.’

Vimes relaxed again.

‘Perhaps you would like to see her, while she is here?’

‘Oh, no. No way. Not while Angua can’t even visit Carrot, I—’

Vetinari held up a hand. ‘For her sake, if not for your own?’

Vimes’s eyes narrowed. ‘You told her about the whiskey, didn’t you?’

Vetinari sighed. ‘Vimes, I didn’t need to, you walked across the Brass Bridge in broad daylight with the bottle in your hand.’

Vimes blinked. ‘Oh,’ he said, dejectedly. He stared down at the table for a while. At last he said, ‘What if I have that meeting with Sybil instead of you?’

Vetinari seemed puzzled for a moment. ‘I’m sorry, Commander?’

Vimes shrugged. ‘Just an idea, sir. I assume you already have reports on the dimensions of the equipment and so on? If Sybil can show me the layout of the buildings, I’m sure I can make the decisions myself. If you want me to, that is.’

The Patrician smiled. ‘Yes, I suppose so. Thank you, Commander. The maps are laid out in the Rats’ Chamber, I will have Drumknott bring you the reports, as you say. She will be here at 10, perhaps you could come up to the office for a full briefing at 11?’

‘Yes, sir.’ Vimes began to relax. Perhaps he had redeemed himself slightly.

‘Capital! Oh, and there was just one other little thing. In her letter, Lady Sybil asked me to pass on a message, what was it, now?’

Vimes narrowed his eyes again, he didn’t like where this was heading.

Vetinari tapped his chin absent-mindedly with his cane, glancing up at the ceiling as if for inspiration. His face lit up. ‘Ah, of course, that was it, I remember now. She said that she found the Dis-Organizer and will be bringing it along for you later.’ He let his wide grin slowly fall into a solemn, reproachful look. ‘Really, Commander, the sock drawer?’ He shook his head sadly. ‘How very… unimaginative.’ He smiled again and stepped out of the room.

Just before the door closed behind him, he heard Vimes’s voice, which was very slightly muffled as he put head in his hands.

‘Oh for fu—’

The door clicked shut.

—

News had got around in an Ankh-Morpork kind of way. The Times hadn’t reported on it, but the whole city seemed to be aware of Carrot’s illness. Vimes attracted far more sidelong glances than usual as he trudged through the slushy brown snow towards the Watch House.

Which was silent.

A few officers were bent over their reports, some had just come off their patrols and their bluish fingers were wrapped around mugs of cocoa, melting snowflakes still clinging to their uniforms. But none of them were speaking or even making eye contact with each other.

Cheery looked up from the duty desk and saluted.

'Any news about Carrot?' asked Vimes. 

Cheery shook her head. 'Sorry, sir.' 

‘It's alright. I'd have been surprised if there was. What’s been happening overnight?’

The dwarf seemed more nervous than usual. ‘Um… nothing, sir.’

‘What, you mean nothing unusual?’

‘No, sir, I really do mean nothing. Nothing _at all_.’ She fidgeted. ‘I mean to say that there have been no crimes at all.’

‘What?’ Vimes glanced around the Watch House again. They were all trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, not wanting to be the one to attract his attention. Ah, thought Vimes, I see. It’s like when I was in Uberwald; crime rates plummeted and by all accounts, the city had never been so quiet. Only this time it’s worse, because there’s Angua to consider too. Nobody wants to get on _her_ bad side now. In the privacy of his head, he was almost proud of Ankh-Morpork in that moment. At least our criminal classes aren’t stupid.

Aloud, he said, ‘I see. Well, in that case I’m going out on patrol. I have meetings at the Palace from 10am, but if _anything_ happens, anything at all, I want to know about it straight away.’

Cheery nodded. Very emphatically.

—

Vimes was only slightly surprised to find that Cheery had been right. Nothing was happening. People were going about their completely lawful business. Very quietly. If things didn’t pick up again soon, he might have to make a start on some of his paperwork. He shuddered slightly at the thought.

His feet took him back to the Palace at 9:50am. As he headed to the Rats’ chamber, he picked up the familiar scent of Sybil’s perfume and the chemical smell associated with dragons. He’d only been away for two days, but he had butterflies in his stomach.

When he rounded the corner and saw her, the butterflies became fully-grown swamp dragons. She turned around and they stared at each other. What was he supposed to say? He had to keep away from her, otherwise staying at the Palace would be a bit pointless. Everything he wanted to say to her was washed away by a wave of pure emotion welling up inside him. There was his love for her, of course; but there was also grief for the time he would have spent with Young Sam, fear for Carrot’s life, and above all, anger at the whole world for letting this happen.

Luckily, Sybil and her big heart came to his rescue with a torrent of questions in her glorious, booming voice. ‘Are you taking care of yourself? Have you been eating plenty of fruit? Any bacon sandwiches?’ 

The litany went on. On the outside, Vimes’s responses were monotonous and monosyllabic, but on the inside his heart was singing.

At last, she said, ‘Right then, let’s have a look at where we can put these hospitals, shall we?’

‘Yes, dear.’ He unrolled one of the maps and absent-mindedly used a small wooden box on the table as a paperweight.

‘Bingeley-bingeley beep!’

Vimes closed his eyes. He’d forgotten about the damned imp. With a sidelong glance at Sybil, he picked the box up again and opened it.

‘Good morning, Insert-Name-Here! Would you like me to read your To-Do-List for today?’

‘No, thank you,’ he said, through gritted teeth. ‘Just keep quiet until we’re finished here.’

‘But—’

Vimes snapped the lid shut again, with another guilty glance at his wife.

Sybil folded her arms. ‘Sam!’

‘Sorry, dear. I’ll have a look for the instruction manual when I get back to the Yard, it’s probably in my office somewhere.’ He instantly regretted saying it, but it seemed to do the trick.

‘Well, it’s certainly not anywhere in the house, unless one of the dragons got it, I suppose.’

Vimes seized on this potential excuse. ‘Very flammable things, operating manuals.’ He realised instantly that he should have dialled back the enthusiasm, and decided that moving the conversation on as soon as possible would be a good plan. ‘Right, well then. I’ve got the details from Drumknott here. The new breathing contraptions are powered by golems, so we’ll need a building that can take a substantial weight. That rules out a lot of the Morpork properties, but I think most of those will be too small in any case. 

He persisted with the babbling until her expression thawed and she crossed the room to look at the map from the other side of the table. He was glad that she was here, she knew which buildings were leased and which were vacant, which ones were already empty and which were used for storage. Vimes didn’t have a clue about any of that, he’d never taken much of an interest in the estate.

Besides, for now, he was simply basking in her presence.

—

The meeting didn’t take up the whole hour, but it wasn’t worth heading back to Pseudopolis Yard, so Vimes headed straight up the stairs. To his surprise, Drumknott let him go straight through to the office.

‘Ah, Commander. Do take a seat.’ Vetinari was still writing, but gestured to the chair with his other hand.

Vimes sat down without argument. He wasn’t in the mood for silly buggers.

Vetinari put down his pen and looked up. ‘Do you have anything to report before we begin?’

Vimes considered this. ‘Only that there have been no crimes at all since yesterday, sir.’

Vetinari nodded. ‘Indeed, Commander. I have heard the same. In fact, there haven’t even been any _licensed_ thefts since yesterday morning. It will soon be a record low for the city. The only time we have had lower crime levels in living memory was when the Guild of Watchmen was established.’ He smiled. ‘An important lesson to us all, I feel, on the fragile nature of the relationship between correlation and causality.’

‘Sir.’

Vetinari sighed at Vimes’s blank expression. He sometimes wondered why he bothered. ‘And the renovations for the temporary hospitals?’

Vimes handed him the list they had drawn up. ‘We’ve chosen the buildings, sir. There are a few interior walls that’ll need to be knocked down to make room inside some of them, nothing major though. Of course, most of the properties are in Ankh,’ here, he winced slightly out of sheer Morporkian embarrassment, ‘which is less than ideal.’

‘In terms of population distribution?’ Vetinari steepled his fingers. ‘Yes, I’m inclined to agree, unfortunately.’

‘The buildings on the Morpork side just aren’t going to be big enough, sir. There’s the unreal estate, although that would be unpredictable to say the least.’ He paused. ‘There’s always the Assassins’ Guild, sir. Big buildings, lots of space.’ Or maybe not, he thought, as the eyebrow before him was raised. Well, it was worth a shot.

Vetinari glanced down towards Filigree Street, his face carefully blank. ‘I don’t think that will be necessary, Commander. _So_ kind of you to offer, though. No, I think that the buildings you have selected in Ankh will be quite sufficient. They are set in considerably more land, for one thing, and any distance from busy streets can only be a good thing.’

‘Just as you say, sir,’ said Vimes.

‘Quite. If all goes to plan, the buildings may not be required at all, in fact.’

‘Sir?’ Vimes tried to keep the little note of hope out of his voice.

‘I’m pleased to say that Leonard da Quirm has been very busy indeed; he has been working on something other than the breathing devices for the hospitals. Something new. He noticed, during his time in Lancre, that milkmaids tended to be far less susceptible to smallpox than other people. He studied this in some detail and found that people who had caught cowpox were, in fact, immune to smallpox due to the similarities between the diseases.’

He caught the look on Vimes’s face. ‘All right, I’ll give you the abridged version, as it were. He is going to try giving people a sample of the disease which has been weakened. The wizards believe that they can do this by exposing the sample to controlled thaumaturgical radiation.

This sounded odd to Vimes, but it seemed to make sense, broadly speaking. There was just one part that weighed on his mind. ‘Sample, sir?’ he asked.

Vetinari opened his mouth, then closed it again.

‘Alright,’ said Vimes, hurriedly, ‘I probably don’t want to know, do I?’

Vetinari smiled. ‘Indeed. Now, the new _vaccine_ as we are calling it, will need to be tested. I am somewhat reluctant to offer a financial incentive, lest we incite a riot. This is, after all, Ankh-Morpork. However, people who partake in the trial will need to be compensated for their time in some way. I will therefore need some form of crowd control from the Watch.’

Vimes pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said. He didn’t add: against my better judgement, sir.

‘Good. I will grant The Times an interview and explain the situation to them. I will inform you when we are ready to proceed.’ Vetinari glanced out of the window again. ‘Well, fortuitously that was all I needed to discuss with you today, Commander, because it looks as though you are required elsewhere.’

With a growing sense of dread, Vimes turned around slowly and looked out of the window.

He swore and broke into a run.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm loving the comments so far, it's still crazy to me that actual people are actually reading my work! PLEASE let me know if there is anything you would like to change or anything you'd like to see more/less of - I'm still learning!


	8. That greatest of all treasures, which is Hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Vimes takes a big risk, and The Times reports on the new vaccines.

Much later, Nobby and Colon, who had only just arrived for the start of the night shift, exchanged glances as Vimes ran up the stairs. They simultaneously and wordlessly decided that, despite the official rota, now might be a very good time to go out on patrol, in the very best traditions of Watchmen whose superior officers had just stormed into the building with a face like thunder.

—

Vimes slumped, at last, into his desk chair. He didn’t know what else to do, or where else to go. He’d taken a shower and changed into a spare uniform and dressed his wounds himself, giving orders that his office was strictly off-limits to all humans.

There was a knock on the door and the timid face of Cheery Littlebottom appeared.

‘His Lordship has requested –‘

‘No,’ Vimes cut in. Then he frowned. ‘Shouldn’t your shift have ended a couple of hours ago?’

‘It’s all right Mister Vimes. I wanted to be here after…’

Vimes made an effort to soften the expression on his face and lower his voice. ‘Thank you, Corporal. I appreciate it. There’s no need for you to stay, though. Would you get a message to Vetinari for me before you go home?’

‘I’m afraid he’s insisted on seeing you, sir.’

‘Did you tell him that –‘

‘Yes, sir, I sent another message back. He says that he will meet you in the Palace Gardens and keep his distance from you, and that it really isn’t negotiable, sir.’

Vimes rubbed his eyes. ‘Fine! Fine. Tell that I’m on my way, then.’

—

It was close enough to the winter solstice that it had already been dark for hours, so they walked slowly under the orange glow of the lamps that lined the paths, in complete silence. Vimes was still having trouble reining the Beast back in.

Vetinari gently broke the silence. ‘What happened, Commander?

Vimes gave him a bitter laugh. ‘You don’t know already? Don’t you normally get three days’ written notice before anything is allowed to happen in this city?’

Vetinari sighed. ‘Please, Vimes, don’t be difficult. Just tell me what happened.’

‘Oh dear, had a stressful day, have you?’ Vimes growled. ‘My heart bleeds for you.’ He was vaguely aware that taking it out on Vetinari wasn’t the wisest course of action.

Yes, thought Vetinari, I have had a stressful day. I watched you break into a burning building without backup and I lost sight of you when the golems arrived. I had to sit through a meeting thinking you were still trapped in there.

Aloud, he said, ‘I do need to know, Commander.’

Vimes took a deep breath to calm himself down and gave in, stealing a sidelong glance at Vetinari. ‘I still don’t even know how it started, sir. Cheery thought there might have been an accelerant. By the time I got there, the fire had already spread to three other buildings. The streets were deserted, so nobody saw anything.’

Vetinari was confident that he knew what that meant. Someone had found out that the plague was in one of those houses and had taken matters into their own hands. He knew that Vimes would have reached that conclusion too, so he said nothing.

‘There wasn’t time to wait for the golems. They were screaming upstairs. I tried to get them all out, but I wasn’t quick enough.’

Vetinari was in awe of Vimes’s relentless sense that the world could and should be better than it is now, and his agony and soul-destroying guilt at never quite being good enough to make it so. And he could see the way it crushed him.

Vetinari wasn’t like that. He didn’t have pre-conceived ideas of how things should be. Vetinari had simply looked at Lord Winder and Mad Lord Snapcase and thought “I can do better”. And he had done better. It was the same idea, the same devotion to the city, just approached from the other side.

In that moment, Vetinari was overwhelmed by Vimes’s sheer capacity to _feel_. He felt as though this was one of the rare occasions where he could talk to the real Sam Vimes. It’s like a sandcastle. Only when the waves of anger subside can you see that the defences he’s so carefully built around himself have all been washed away with them. So, he pulls himself together every time and builds them up again. Taller, this time. Stronger.

He found that just now he wanted nothing more than to be able to hold him tight, which was a scary revelation in itself.

The two men walked in silence, masks on, shields up, each with a part of themselves locked away deep inside.

Inside Vimes, the Beast was howling in agony.

Inside Vetinari, Havelock was calling out to him.

They couldn’t hear each other.

‘Three people died in there,’ said Vimes, although it wasn’t clear if he was talking to Vetinari or himself.

When Vetinari decided that he could trust himself to speak again, he said, ‘And the little girl you carried out of the building—?'

‘Had the plague. She was too sick to get out, but she was still alive. I took her straight to the hospital myself.’

Vetinari nodded.

They walked on.

‘I’ll show you how to get to your bedroom without using the main passages, there needn’t be any cross-contamination at all.’ He sighed when Vimes turned to stare at him in disbelief. They stopped walking. ‘Strangely enough, Commander, I did consider what would happen if either of us became unwell before asking you to stay here.’

There was silence.

‘How long before we know for certain?’

Vetinari held his gaze. It was somehow easier in the soft light. ‘It’s tricky to tell, I’m afraid. My best guess based on the little evidence we have is that symptoms would start within a week, so that is how long you will need to remain in quarantine, I’m sorry to say. After that, it’s impossible to say, it progresses very differently in different people.’

‘A week…’ Vimes repeated. ‘Alright. And the Watch—?’

‘—Will have to manage without you in the meantime, Commander.’

The sentence hung in the air between them, surrounded by a swarm of “what ifs”.

They walked back to the palace.

—

The next day, Sergeant Angua stood before Vetinari in the Oblong Office, with a wooden expression to rival Vimes’s own. The man who started the fire hadn’t evaded capture for very long at all, and Vetinari, for one, was relieved that Vimes hadn’t been the one to catch him.

‘Since Commander Vimes didn’t witness the start of the fire, and we have his written statement already, I think it would be prudent to hold the trial while he is still in quarantine, don’t you, Sergeant?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Vetinari made some notes. ‘And how is Captain Carrot, Sergeant, if you don’t mind my asking?’ he asked.

‘They say he’s improved a little, sir,’ said Angua, her voice unchanged.

‘Glad to hear it. It is so nice to hear some good news for a change.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And the Watch is managing without Commander Vimes?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Vetinari waited.

Angua seemed to realise that he was expecting a little more detail. ‘Well, I’ve got Sergeant Detritus and Corporal Littlebottom to help me, sir. And Sergeant Colon, of course,’ she added, hurriedly.

The corner of Vetinari’s mouth twitched slightly. ‘Indeed. Well, thank you, Sergeant. Don’t let me detain you.’

Angua saluted and left the office.

Vetinari sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. His last appointment of the day was in sight. Unfortunately, that appointment was an interview with William de Worde. 

—

Early mornings were one of Vetinari’s few pleasures in life. He had a little time to himself before the problems of the day really got going.

A clerk placed a copy of the Times on the Patrician’s desk.

‘Oh dear,’ he said, to himself rather than to the clerk, with a little smile as he looked over the cartoon. ‘Mr de Worde has rather outdone himself this time, I’m afraid. “The Patrician wants volunteers to test these new preventatives”.’ [7] He shook his head. ‘I really should have seen that one coming.’ He considered the implications of the phrase and cleared his throat. ‘Well, thank you.’

He dismissed the clerk, who bowed and left the room. As the door opened, Vetinari looked up sharply. ‘Wait,’ he said.

The clerk froze.

Someone down the corridor was coughing.

‘Send for the doctor. Immediately,’ said Vetinari, hoping his voice sounded level.

The clerk nodded and hurried out.

It could just be the smoke from the fire, Vetinari told himself. Vimes ran into a burning building after all; it might not mean anything at all.

And, for a while, Lord Vetinari possessed that greatest of all treasures, which is Hope.

[7] Luckily for you, I can’t draw, so I’ll leave the cartoon to your imagination.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter should be up very soon, it's already nearly there!


	9. The threads that form the trousers of time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Vetinari delivers and receives bad news, and he plays a new game for the very first time.

Once again, Angua found herself standing to attention in the Oblong Office. It wasn’t something she felt she’d ever get used to.

‘Ah, sergeant, thank you for coming at such short notice, do take a seat.’

She sat down opposite Vetinari, slightly warily.

Vetinari put down his pen. ‘I’ve got some rather bad news, I’m afraid. Commander Vimes was taken ill this morning, he is already in hospital.’

Angua closed her eyes briefly. ‘Does Lady Sybil know?’

Vetinari shook his head. ‘Not yet.’

‘I’ll tell her, sir,’ she said.

‘Well, that’s very kind of you, are you sure?’ said Vetinari.

Angua nodded. ‘I’d rather she didn’t hear it from a clerk or in a letter, sir.’

Vetinari regarded her for a moment. ‘Alright then, thank you. Doctor Lawn is taking personal charge of his care and will notify me immediately if anything changes.’ He paused. ‘Unfortunately, that isn’t the only bad news; I’ve received word from the hospital that Emily Owens passed away during the night.’ 

Angua’s eyes widened. ‘Is that the girl Commander Vimes rescued?’

Vetinari nodded.

Even in her current shape, Angua could smell the notes of fear on Vetinari. She’d never spent much time with him, and suspected that her sense of smell was one of the reasons he’d always avoided it. She had a newfound respect for him, she’d never come across such disparity between body language and scent in a human before.

He continued, ‘There was nothing they could do to prevent it, it seems. The doctors say that black spots appear on the body when the disease reaches a certain stage, and nobody is known to have survived beyond that point. This has been observed in other cities too.’

Angua took a deep breath. ‘Mister Vimes can’t find out about this.’

‘My thoughts exactly, sergeant, and I have already said as much to Doctor Lawn. But, if it is any consolation, the nurses had made the girl comfortable and she died painlessly in her sleep, which is a great deal better than the alternative.’ He shrugged. ‘And the man responsible for the fire has been hanged, thanks to the Watch.’

A tiny fragment of anger found its way into the scent. Rightly so, Angua thought. Three people died horrible, painful deaths, a fourth person was now dead and Mister Vimes could die too. And for what? She almost regretted doing things by the book.

—

Agonising days passed. The death toll crept up, past the singles, into the tens, edging ever closer to the hundreds. Every day, they got a step closer to a vaccine, but they also got an equal step closer to a death toll that would tip Ankh-Morpork over the edge. They might have a vaccine by Hogswatch, apparently. That had a nice ring to it.

As Vetinari walked down one of the corridors on the fifth floor of the Palace, he heard a noise coming from the direction of Vimes’s bedroom. A knife appeared in his hand and he moved noiselessly down the corridor. He edged the door open and found the room empty. He swiftly searched the room, but it was devoid of any threat. 

He turned to look at a small wooden box on the table by the bed. Ah, of course. Vetinari’s mind presented him with several reasons not to touch the Dis-Organizer. They were all very good reasons. Potential contamination was at the top of the list. It therefore came as a slight shock when he found himself using a handkerchief to ease the lid of the box open.

He was greeted by a manic, grinning little face, with an even more manic voice. ‘You have one unopened memo, Insert-Name-Here. Would you like me to play it back for you?’

‘Why not?’ said Vetinari, and his mind once again gave him a detailed argument against it.

The imp started to speak in Vimes’s voice.

_Very_ loudly.

The vast majority of the words were perfectly innocent and ordinary ones, when they were considered individually. The combination, however, with the addition of a few expletives for good measure, resulted in the most creative verbal assault Vetinari had ever encountered. The tirade seemed to largely be a number of threats directed at the imp, but after a while it became hard to tell.

There was a distant thump in the background noise of the recording, then the shouting stopped.

Vetinari looked up. A second hole had been added to the wall, or rather, removed from it, since the last time he had been in the room.

He wanted to laugh, or scream, or _something_.

Instead, he snapped the lid shut and went back to his office.

—

The following day, there was a knock on the door of the Oblong Office.

‘Come.’

A clerk entered. ‘Message from the hospital, my lord.’

Vetinari held out his hand and the clerk handed him the envelope. He waited until the door clicked shut to open it. There were only two words on the paper.

It read: **Black spots.**

He shut his eyes and put his head in his hands.

He drew himself upright and took a deep breath. Then he took the speaking tube off its hook. ‘Drumknott? Clear my appointments for the rest of the day. Mustrum Ridcully has an appointment with me _right now_.’

—

Ridcully blinked. ‘Well, yes, it is generally accepted. It’s something of a tradition, really. And the Rite of AshkEnte is straightforward enough. But…’

‘Yes?’ said Vetinari, fixing Ridcully with a piercing look.

‘Well, you’ll have to wager your own life too.’

Vetinari raised an eyebrow. ‘Double or quits, as it were?’

‘Yes, I suppose so. Look, Havelock, are you sure about this?’

Vetinari stared at Ridcully long enough to make him question every choice that had led him to this point. Eventually, he said, ‘I will expect you back here with seven of your least irritating colleagues within the hour. Don’t let me detain you.’

—

Vetinari could hear the wizards arguing in the anteroom. It was almost time. There was just one last thing he needed to do, for his own peace of mind. He crossed the room and opened a cabinet. He took out a jar and a packet labelled “Trucklement’s Yummy Assortment” and brought them both back to his desk.

Wuffles, stirred by the smell of the dog biscuits, woke up and stretched in his little basket under the desk. He yawned, then got up and ambled over to Vetinari’s feet, bones creaking slightly as he moved. He eased himself into a passable if somewhat rickety attempt at a “sit” with inquisitive eyes.

Vetinari, meanwhile, had opened the packet and sorted the biscuits by colour, with the all the reverential care of a miser counting coins. He began placing them in the jar one by one, very gently so as not to break any, with the exception of the yellow ones, which were scooped up with considerably less care and deposited into the wastepaper basket. [8]

The Patrician of Ankh-Morpork could, of course, order a packet of biscuits with the yellow ones already removed, but somehow it was always a task he preferred to do for himself. He selected a biscuit from the top of the jar and offered it to Wuffles. The little tail thumped on the floor as the biscuit disappeared. Vetinari’s fingers found their way into the wiry fur; and the tail thumped a little louder. He looked away abruptly and pulled back his hand as though he’d been stung. Wuffles gave a little whine at the sudden and inexplicable loss of contact.

Vetinari rang the bell for his clerk.

‘Drumknott, would you be so kind as to take Wuffles for a walk?’

Drumknott gave him a puzzled look. ‘Yes, of course, my lord, but why—'

‘A _long_ walk, if you please,’ he said, sharply, still not looking at the dog. ‘And would you send the wizards in now?’

‘Of course, my lord.’ He scooped up the little dog and carried him out of the room.

Vetinari nodded to Ridcully, then went and stood at the window, watching the city below. The younger wizards were moving furniture behind him and Ridcully was shouting a lot, but he barely heard any of it.

The noise died away and Ridcully cleared his throat. Vetinari turned around and raised an eyebrow at the circle that they had chalked on the floor. There was a small table straddling the chalk outline, with a chair on either side. Ridcully followed his gaze and gave a little shrug. ‘That’s where he’ll turn up, my lord. He won’t be able to leave that circle until we say so.’

Vetinari nodded. The wizards took up their places around the circle.

—

In Death’s Domain, a string of paper sausages fluttered to the ground.

Albert watched them fall. He turned to the Death of Rats. ‘Timing could have been worse, I s’pose.’

SQUEAK?

‘Well,’ said Albert, ‘They could have summoned him when we were bringing the oak tree inside.’

The Death of Rats seemed thoughtful for a while, then glanced up at the ceramic pot. He nodded sagely. SQUEAK.

Albert sighed, picking up the paper chain. ‘These young wizards today just have no manners.’

—

OH, IT’S YOU LOT AGAIN. I MIGHT HAVE KNOWN. WILL THIS TAKE LONG? I WAS IN THE MIDDLE OF DECORATING THE HOGSWATCH TREE.

Vetinari cleared his throat and Death turned to face him. ‘I have heard that humans may challenge you for the life of someone who is close to death. Is this true?’

YES. WHO DID YOU HAVE IN MIND?

‘Samuel Vimes.’

AH, COMMANDER VIMES. I’VE SEEN HIM A FEW TIMES. HE’S CLOSE TO DEATH AGAIN, IS HE?

Vetinari raised an eyebrow. ‘You don’t know yourself?’

Death sighed, an impressive feat in one without lungs. THERE’S THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE, YOU SEE. NOT TO MENTION ALL THESE CONTINUINUINUUMS ALL OVER THE PLACE. AND THERE’S ALWAYS QUANTUM, OF COURSE.

Ponder Stibbons winced. Vetinari could also see out of the corner of his eye that Ridcully was nodding his head in sympathy with Death.

‘I have it on good authority,’ he said, although he had to admit that this did seem an odd thing to say to Death himself.

YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT IS AT STAKE? 

Vetinari nodded.

VERY WELL. BUT I’M NOT PLAYING CHESS. I CAN NEVER REMEMBER WHICH WAY THE LITTLE HORSEY MOVES. I DON’T MIND CARDS… EXCEPT CRIPPLE MR ONION.

Vetinari hesitated. He had a poker face that would bankrupt the Gamblers’ Guild, but that wasn’t much of an advantage against a skeleton with glowing eyes. Stealth chess would have been his preference, of course, but there was another option.

‘I’m afraid I don’t have a deck of cards, but I do have another game here.’ He crossed the room and opened the bottom drawer of his desk. He pulled out a package, opening the paper carefully. ‘This was a gift from the Low King of the Dwarfs. I believe the closest translation we have in Morporkian is “Thud”. I haven’t yet had a chance to play, but perhaps this would be a good opportunity.’

Death seemed slightly suspicious. THAT LOOKS LIKE A CHESS BOARD TO ME.

‘It is a similar concept, so I have heard, but I believe that there are only two kinds of piece: the dwarfs and the trolls.’

Death appeared to consider this. ALL RIGHT, he said at last. WHAT ARE THE RULES?

If there is one thing Havelock Vetinari has always been good at, it is taking things in his stride. Even as he explained the rules of an unfamiliar game to an anthropomorphic personification, with his own life and the life of Sam Vimes on the line, every movement in laying out the pieces was deliberate and controlled and his face was completely blank.

At last, the tall, black-robed figure solemnly took his place at the table.

And so did Death.

‘After you,’ said Vetinari, waving a graceful hand over the board.

Death studied the board for a while, then made his first move.

The pieces clicked on the stone tablet and the sounds rang out in the otherwise silent room. With every move, every decision made, another universe spun out in front of them. The threads separated, then intertwined and converged again, weaving into the fabric of the two possible eventual outcomes.

You could follow one thread as Vetinari’s concentration lapsed and he made an oversight in his opening, noticing the mistake far too late. He knew that it was all over but was forced to spend his last moments playing through to the end of the game, trying not to contemplate what might have been. Death made his final move and it was all over. Vetinari accepted his fate with all the grace he’d had in life and went with Death willingly.

The city lost its Patrician and its Commander of the Watch in that instant. Ankh-Morpork fell into the hands of people who didn’t care that she was bleeding. They took advantage of Captain Carrot’s illness and he was assassinated. The Plague rampaged and tens of thousands of people died. Tens of thousands more died in the chaos that followed, through starvation and rioting. The dwarves and trolls were driven out of Ankh-Morpork and, without their labour, life in the city broke down. The City Watch was crippled and broken and coppers, without direction, fell back into their old ways.

Sam Vimes was buried in the snow in the little cemetery in Small Gods, in his dented street uniform at the insistence of his wife. He’d got a good spot, they’d said afterwards, he’d be able to see John Keel from there, they could keep each other company. Lady Sybil Vimes wore black for the rest of her life, and Young Sam grew up without a father, just like his namesake. He never read “Where’s My Cow?”, never counted down the minutes to six o’clock. People would tell him, when he was old enough to understand, what his father had been like. He loved hearing the stories, but he didn’t entirely believe them. Nobody, he thought, could really be that strong, or brave, or kind.

Which just goes to show that cynicism is at least partly genetic.

It is worth noting that there were far fewer threads leading to that trouser leg of time. This was Havelock Vetinari, after all.

In the other trouser leg, Vetinari made his move.

OH. BUGGER.

‘I’m afraid so,’ said Vetinari. He straightened up, then extended his hand over the board.

Death met his gaze, then slowly reached out and shook his hand. Then he turned to Ridcully.

CAN I GO NOW? YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT BEING SUMMONED LIKE THIS. I’M VERY BUSY AT THE MOMENT, AND IT’S ALMOST TIME TO FEED THE CATS.

Across the city, Sam Vimes opened his eyes.

[8] Wuffles didn’t even turn his head. He had never liked the yellow ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can we just take a moment to appreciate the fact that Vetinari has managed not to be the damsel in distress this time? There's a first time for everything!


	10. The freedom to take the consequences

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dr Lawn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, we're back. It ain't much, but it's honest work. I'd like to say a massive thank you to everyone in the comments section for being so supportive, it really makes a huge difference. I basically panicked and let this get on top of me, but now I'm back to taking it one step at a time so we should be ok!

There was, of course, a universe in which Havelock Vetinari allowed the disease to run its course, and Sam Vimes died alone in hospital.

In fact, there were millions of them, with millions of different outcomes.

And while Dr Mossy Lawn would never have chosen any of these outcomes over the current one, his immediate future would certainly have been considerably quieter. He took a moment to make sense of the scene before him, then he raised his voice.

‘Commander Vimes, this may have been your building until very recently, but it is, in fact, my hospital, so would you be so kind as to _stop shouting_?’

Vimes turned away from the unfortunate nurse to glare at him, and Mossy won a small prize for keeping a straight face. He had been put in one of the iron lungs, and despite his desperate thrashing, only his head was visible, with the rubber seal pulled taut around his neck.

‘Thank you,’ he said, then he nodded to the nurse. ‘I think we should probably let him out now, nurse, while I can still resist the urge to take an iconograph and have a copy framed for my office.’

‘Yeah, very funny,’ growled Vimes, his voice hoarser than usual; it sounded as though it had been dragged over red-hot gravel. His hand went to his throat as soon as his neck was released from the seal. ‘What is this thing?’ he asked.

‘This? Oh, I suppose you wouldn’t have seen it yet, what with one thing and another. It’s a new machine, someone at the Palace designed it. We use it when patients can no longer breathe for themselves.’ He paused while this information sank in, then continued, ‘Frankly, I’m astonished to see you awake, Commander, we were beginning to prepare for the worst.’

Vimes wasn’t sure how he was supposed to respond to this. In the end, he said, ‘I still feel like shit, if it makes you feel any better.’

Lawn chuckled, fastening a mask over his face and putting on a long pair of gloves. ‘Well, the fact that you smoke like a chimney at the best of times won’t be doing you any favours, you know.’ By the time he turned around again, the nurse had freed Vimes from the contraption and he was trying to swing his legs out of bed. The sudden movement brought on a violent coughing fit and he was forced to lie down again.

‘I should take it easy, if I was you,’ said Lawn. ‘Although I’m strangely relieved to see that you’re still taking medical advice just as seriously as you did back in the good old days.’ Vimes shot him a warning glance through the hacking coughs, but the nurse had enough sense to make herself scarce so there was no-one to overhear. The coughing subsided, and while Lawn was measuring his heartrate, he had a chance to take a look around the room.

It wasn’t one of the bigger wards, but there were around twenty patients, each in encased in steel. Now that he wasn’t “going spare” as Nobby would say, he noticed the sound for the first time. There was the rhythmic sound of the golem pumping the bellows, and the hissing of the air moving through the tubes. And that was it. The stillness of the scene was eerie and made Vimes shudder, it was like a morgue.

He wondered how on the Disc Vetinari had managed to get so many of the godsdamned things built so quickly. Well, probably by being Vetinari, that’s how. That’s how Ankh-Morpork worked. He kept all the money sloshing around in the city rather than in the treasury, and all the while he let the Guild leaders and aristocrats think that they were getting one over on him. And when he needed it, he called in all those little favours, all those overdue taxes, and made it their problem. The man was an artist.

—

The wizards had returned the furniture and had even swept up the worst of the chalk, leaving just enough chalk dust ingrained in the floorboards to give the housekeepers something to think about. Vetinari had left Ridcully with something to think about too, specifically, the phrase ‘I know I can count on your discretion’. He had returned to his desk, in the hope of restoring some normality to the rest of the day. There was a tentative knock on the door.

‘Come,’ he said, fighting to keep the edge of weariness out of his voice.

Drumknott entered, with Wuffles padding behind. The clerk unclipped the leash and the dog pottered back to the security of his little world under the desk.

‘Thank you, Drumknott,’ Vetinari said, although he was looking down into the cloudy pair of eyes that weren’t quite focussing on him. Drumknott said nothing and slipped out of the room again, leaving him alone with just his thoughts and the latest reports from Pseudopolis. He sighed and picked up his pen.

He made a note to pass on the design of the iron lung to the other cities by clacks, now that they’d established that it was a success, although he was sure it would do very little good; they were less open-minded than Ankh-Morpork when it came to allowing other species into the city, let alone golems. Without its non-human citizens, Ankh-Morpork wouldn’t have been able to hold off the plague for as long as it had, nor would it have been able to sustain its population and keep day-to-day life running as smoothly as it ever had.

Then again, Pseudopolis had already survived another plague in living memory, so perhaps it would manage to do so again.

Vetinari frowned slightly. He kept glancing towards the window and was struggling to keep his attention on his work, which was not something he was used to. He was even less used to the way he was starting to feel. He didn’t regret what he’d done, but he was feeling guilty about it. And guilt without regret is meaningless, he had always thought. Guilt is surely nothing more than a mechanism for learning from one’s mistakes; without a mistake to learn from, is it not redundant?

But for the first time since becoming Patrician, he’d risked putting something, or rather, _someone_ before the city, and that wasn't something he could shrug off so easily. The end result had been a net gain for the city, or so it seemed, but it might not have turned out that way. Perhaps most people felt like this all the time, he thought, always questioning and second-guessing what they’d done. It really was no wonder, then, that most people never seemed to get anything done.

There was another knock on the door, causing the frown to deepen. This time, the door opened before he responded, and Drumknott entered the room again with a tea tray. This earned him a pointed glance at the clock and a raised eyebrow, but he continued to cross the room and set the tray down on the desk nevertheless.

Drumknott was trembling slightly with the audacity of what he’d just done, but he was almost certain that the gamble would pay off. Even he wasn’t able to read his lordship’s expressions, but he knew when his usual patterns had been broken, so he’d decided that an extra pot of tea probably wouldn’t be unwelcome.

Vetinari watched as Drumknott scurried out of the room again without saying a word, and only when the door closed behind him did he allow himself a small smile. Now _there_ was a man who lived between second-guesses. He briefly considered going to thank him, but decided that, on balance, the poor man was probably frightened enough. He poured himself a cup of tea, and got back to work, trying once again to contain his feelings as one might contain a small yellow lizard in a glass jar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another massive thank you for your patience, I've started quite small while I'm getting back into it! I suddenly feel like I'm under a lot of pressure to do the characters justice, so bear with me!
> 
> If you haven't already, you can find me on Tumblr @datsderbunnyblog, I'm posting memes and quotes/headcanon threads at irregular intervals, as well as links to my AO3 fics. Always up for a Discworld chat if you're on there!


	11. Damage control

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Vetinari makes a confession, Vimes receives some news and metaphors are interrupted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does this even make sense? Who knows? I certainly don't. Good luck!

‘Sybil, please, I—'

‘Really, Havelock, I thought you knew me better than that. I refuse to sit at home and do nothing. If I were to do that, I might as well have gone to the countryside when this all started.’

Vetinari certainly her knew better than to say that he’d have preferred it if she had left the city. He found himself feeling almost flustered, which was a feeling only Sybil Ramkin could manage to induce in him. Often, he was grateful that she limited her meddling to his personal life rather than his political one.

Although, just now, he wasn’t.

They were walking six feet apart through the gardens of the Ramkin mansion. After a while, he said, ‘I’m not asking you to do sit at home and do nothing. I’m asking you to let other people distribute the food parcels to the quarantined families, people of other species, that aren’t at risk from the plague. I’m glad that you’re organising them, truly, but—'

‘Have you told him yet?’ she asked.

He’d been expecting the question. Of course he had. But that didn’t mean it cut any less deeply. He walked on in silence, feeling the crunch of the gravel, the way it shifted underfoot. Sybil stopped walking, and so did he.

‘Havelock?’

‘We have talked,’ he said at last, ‘A few times, in fact. Before he was taken ill, I mean.’

‘But have you told him how you feel?’

He turned to face her. She was looking at him expectantly. He sighed and shook his head. ‘I can’t do it, Sybil.’

‘You can’t keep holding him at arm’s length like this. It’s hurting both of you, even if he doesn’t realise it yet.’

‘You don’t understand, Sybil. I thought I could go through with it, but it’s already clouding my judgement.’

‘You both care about the city, Havelock. Won’t it cloud your judgement more while it’s still one-sided?’ She paused, before adding, ‘We almost lost him.’

I know, he thought. He started walking again, and after a couple of steps Sybil started walking too. It helped, somehow, he felt less vulnerable. ‘Are you sure that this is what you want?’ he asked.

‘I want you both to be happy, Havelock. You both deserve it.’

‘That’s not what I asked, Sybil.’

She smiled. ‘Yes, it is, actually.’

He gave her a little smile. ‘Well, in that case, neither of us deserve you.’

She laughed, and said, ‘Well, I’m hardly suggesting that he runs off after a seamstress half my age.’ She hesitated. ‘It just feels right, somehow. Don’t ask me how.’

For a while, the only sound between them was the gravel. Vetinari had never trusted gravel, it was impossible to move completely silently across it. It would betray where you were with the slightest mistake.

‘All right,’ he said, ‘I’ll think about it.’ The corner of his mouth quirked upwards a fraction. ‘He won’t stay in hospital for long.’

She smiled again. ‘No, he won’t,’ she said, then the smile faded. ‘What happened?’

Vetinari furrowed his brow slightly. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Don’t try to play silly buggers with me, Havelock Vetinari, I live with Sam and he’s much better at it than you. We were preparing for the worst, and suddenly he’s awake and swearing at the nurses.’

His expression gave nothing away.

‘Is there a new cure?’ she asked, although her tone suggested that she didn’t believe it for a second.

Vetinari shook his head. He had hoped to avoid telling her, or anyone for that matter, but he suspected that Vimes would put two and two together, and at least work out that Vetinari had done something. On balance it would be better, if he were to find out, that it came from Sybil. Damage control, that was the main thing now. A controlled detonation. Contain the fire, tame it, use it.

Don’t get burned.

He stopped and looked her in the eye, and he told her.

—

Later that afternoon, a messenger brought an envelope with a black seal to the hospital. It found its way to Dr Lawn’s desk, as he blearily rubbed his eyes. When he saw who it was addressed to, he took it straight up to the ward.

‘I have a message from the Palace for you, Commander.’ Lawn smirked as Vimes rolled his eyes and he crossed the room to hand him the note.

Vimes had been moved to a different ward, he hadn’t needed the ventilator since he’d woken up, and there were plenty of people who did need one. He was glad of that; the hissing sound had unsettled him more than he’d care to admit.

Vimes glanced over the letter, then he looked up at Lawn again. ‘I should be immune to the disease now, right?’

‘I believe so, Commander.’

‘But I could still pass it on to if I come into contact with another contagious person?’

Lawn gave him a little shrug. ‘Your guess is as good as mine. I’m relying on what little information we can piece together, and I don’t think that the other cities had the chance to find out, frankly.’

Vimes stared at the note. As much as he hated himself for thinking it, he didn’t think he could face going home. He wasn’t even sure he could face seeing Sybil, although he knew that he’d have to for her sake. His eyes shot up to Lawn. ‘And the girl? In the fire?’

Lawn gave him a long, blank look. Then he sighed. ‘Lord Vetinari said I wasn’t to tell you… I’m sorry.’

Of course she’s dead, Vimes thought, how could she have possibly survived? She’d looked so desperately ill, and then there was all the smoke. And it wasn’t as if she was the only one who’d died in the fire. He took a deep breath, trying not to think of the weight of the limp body in his arms, the pale little face.

He didn’t know how old she was. Six? Seven? He didn’t even know her name. He wanted to ask, more than anything, but he couldn’t frame the words. Carrot would have known her name. Carrot! He hadn’t had a chance to find out about him either. He asked.

‘He’s doing well, Commander, but his recovery has been rather more… linear than yours, shall we say?’

‘But he’ll survive?’

‘We think so, yes.’

Relief washed over him. He’d almost forgotten what good news felt like. But that must mean that Angua was running the Watch single-handedly, and while gods knew she was more than capable…

‘Bugger this,’ he said at last. He pushed himself up onto his elbows and swung his legs out of bed. ‘Where are my clothes?’

Lawn looked slightly alarmed. ‘We had to burn them, Commander, I’m sorry. I’d advise you not to—’

Vimes had already dragged himself out of bed and was taking unsteady steps. He waved the note at Lawn. ‘If he thinks I’m going to sit on my arse at home, he’s got another thing coming, I’m going back the Palace, then I’m going to work.’

‘Commander, I—’ Lawn closed his mouth and shook his head as he watched His Grace, the Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes leave the room wearing nothing but a hospital gown.

—

‘Look out of the window and tell me what you see.’

To conclude the meeting about subsidies for the Seamstresses’ Guild, Vetinari had prepared a few metaphors about the running of the city for Rosie Palm, depending on which of the possible correct observations she picked up on.

She glanced out of the window. Something in the Rimwards direction drew her gaze and she smiled. ‘Well, correct me if I’m wrong, but I can see the Commander of the Watch walking through the streets in a nightgown.’

Vetinari followed her gaze and his mouth ran dry. He cleared his throat. ‘Indeed, that would appear to be the case. Well, thank you, Mrs Palm, don’t let me detain you.’

Rosie nodded, with an irritating little amused expression on her face. He could never quite shake the feeling that she still saw him as a seventeen-year-old in loose-fitting grey clothes.

He retreated back to his desk and rang the bell.

Rosie gave Drumknott a bright smile and he blushed slightly. Vetinari raised an eyebrow at her when she giggled, but she just winked at him over her shoulder and swept out of the room.

He looked up at his clerk. ‘Drumknott, I think we’re going to have a visitor. Would you ensure that Vimes is shown straight to his old room and instructed to stay there?’

‘Yes, my lord. Will that be all?’

Vetinari hesitated. ‘Actually, no, there is just one other thing…’

—

Vimes sat down on the bed. It was, he had to admit, a relief. The fever had taken a lot out of him and even the walk across the city had left him out of breath. His chest was heavy and he was more exhausted than he’d been for months.

There was a knock on the door. He thought about trying to make himself decent, but that ship had well and truly sailed. He fought to sit up straight. ‘Come in,’ he called.

A servant entered the room with a tray and very emphatically didn’t look at him as he set the tray down on the table.

‘Thank you,’ said Vimes suspiciously. He waited until the servant had left before hauling himself up again to investigate the tray.

He decided that he must still be delirious with fever, or that they’d given him some _really_ good painkillers, the likes of which Vimes would only normally expect to find being sold in little bags on street corners, because it looked for all the world like a bacon sandwich.


	12. Lord Vetinari's godsdamned omniscience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I don't even know any more. Enjoy!

‘Good morning, Commander.’

Vimes closed his eyes. He should have snuck out and gone straight to the Watch House, but he’d been asleep since the previous afternoon and he was absolutely starving. It had been a good plan, it really had, but it hadn’t properly accounted for one inevitable obstacle: Lord Vetinari.

Or, more accurately, Lord Vetinari’s godsdamned omniscience.

He was sitting at the breakfast table, leaning back in his chair with his legs crossed and a fresh cup of coffee in front of him. Vimes somehow found the coffee even more irritating than the fact that the man hadn’t even looked from the report he was reading. There was still steam coming off the cup.

Vimes didn’t like the implication that his behaviour had been predictable enough for Vetinari to plan this little ensemble to the nearest minute. He knew deep down that he really _was_ that predictable, of course, but it still rankled every time Vetinari flaunted it. He didn’t even entertain the possibility that it was a coincidence. Well, it just wouldn’t be, would it?

‘Sir,’ he said stiffly, his voice still hoarse. He’d made a valiant effort to shave and had put on his uniform and armour, but he knew that he was a pale, clammy mess and he was still shivering slightly.

‘Yes, I thought I might have to endure some kind of pantomime along these lines,’ said Vetinari, still casting his eyes over the papers. He sighed. ‘Go back to bed, Vimes.’

‘I’m fine,’ said Vimes, although he was well aware that there was absolutely no chance that he was going to Pseudopolis Yard anytime soon. ‘Mossy said that I’m past the contagious stage, I—’ He faltered slightly in the face of the raised eyebrow and piercing look that were suddenly directed at him, but he rallied again. ‘I’m fine,’ he repeated. ‘I need to get back to the Yard.’

Vetinari sighed again and went back to reading his report. After a while, just as Vimes was starting to contemplate saying something else to fill the silence, Vetinari said, ‘If you’re going to insist on arguing, would you mind sitting down? If you keep on swaying like that in my peripheral vision, I’m afraid I’ll start to get seasick.’

Vimes said nothing as he pulled out a chair and sat down, but in the privacy of his mind he thought: was I really swaying? I just assumed that the room was gently spinning. By way of explanation, for the sake of his own pride if nothing else, he said, ‘It’s just ‘cause I haven’t had a smoke since I went into hospital,’ with a look that said: don’t you dare try to contradict that blatant lie.

Vetinari put down his papers and regarded him for a moment, with a look that said: I’m saying nothing at all. After a little pause, he said, ‘Why are you here, Commander? Why did you discharge yourself against Doctor Lawn’s advice?’ The unspoken question, which was nevertheless the most tangible out of the three, was: why didn’t you put some clothes on first?

‘Why didn’t you tell me about the girl?’ Vimes countered. He hadn’t intended to raise his voice, and his throat was reminding him exactly why. He raised his hand to his neck and settled for glaring at Vetinari.

Vetinari’s expression softened for a fraction of a second, before he responded, ‘You were already in hospital when we found out. We decided not to tell you because you were deteriorating so quickly.’ He hesitated, then added, ‘Ultimately, we thought there was a good chance that you were going to die, Vimes.’

Vimes had long ago given up on trying to decipher Vetinari’s body language. For one thing, there wasn’t much of it, and anything the man did give away was bound to be deliberately misleading. But his Watchman’s brain wasn’t so easily deterred, and had started to subconsciously recognise patterns. It was always the same, whenever the Patrician started to show a shred of evidence of emotion; of _humanity_ , even. Afterwards, there was a slight tension in his face, or something in the eyes, perhaps; a stillness that spoke of a portcullis lowered and a drawbridge raised, of tall, cold, grey stone walls.

But not this time. This time, the expression was… strange. Different. It wasn’t unreadable, just unfamiliar. Vimes hadn’t seen that look on his face before and he had no idea what it meant.

In the silence that followed, Vetinari delicately lifted his coffee cup and took a sip. He put the cup down and gently ran his thumb over his upper lip to remove the froth. He glanced at Vimes then did a double take. ‘Oh dear, have I missed a bit?’ he said with a little smile, turning his head away slightly and this time brushing the back of his fingers over his lips. He turned to face Vimes again. ‘Are you alright, Commander?’

Vimes realised a few seconds too late that he’d been staring at Vetinari’s lips and looked away. ‘I wasn’t planning to stay here as long as I did, I only came back for my uniform. I was going to go back to work yesterday,’ he said, although he knew even as he said it that it wasn’t likely to help his case.

‘But you were so unwell that you were unable to leave your bedroom until now? Yes, I can see now why you think I’d be willing to allow you to go back to work.’ His voice dripped with sarcasm.

Vimes narrowed his eyes. ‘How much bed rest has Mossy said I need?’

‘A minimum of a week.’

They stared at each other. We’re back on familiar ground here, Vimes thought, we’ve danced this particular dance many times before over the years. ‘Two days,’ said Vimes.

‘Two? I don’t think so. I’ll accept five.’

‘Three.’

‘Four.’ 

‘ _Three_.’

Vetinari sighed. ‘You drive a hard bargain, as ever, Commander. All right then, three days.’ He stood up and picked up his cane. ‘Now, I really must get back to work. My coach is already outside, I’m sure Lady Sybil will be glad to have you home.’ His face was carefully blank again as he left Vimes sitting at the table alone.

Outside, Vetinari smiled to himself. Sybil really was a remarkably perceptive woman, perhaps there really was something there after all. He’d always maintained that, had she not devoted her life to her dragons and her family and, regrettably, to meddling in Vetinari’s personal life, such as it was, she’d have made a formidable politician. In that moment, however, he was grateful that she hadn’t.

—

It was strange to be leaving the Palace, Vimes reflected, as the coach rattled out of the gates and into the street. It wasn’t like he was _friends_ with Vetinari or anything. And it _definitely_ wasn’t like he was going to miss the bastard. That would be ridiculous, wouldn’t it? No, it was just that Vetinari had very slowly been starting to seem a bit more like a real person underneath the severe black robes and the raised eyebrow. Yeah. Right, yeah, that was it. Right. Yeah.

Of course, Vetinari had always seemed to be above the kinds of things that ordinary people did, to the extent that most people had, at some point in their dealings with him, questioned whether he was human at all. It reminded Vimes of the way little children think that their teachers live in their school, and never leave. He’s got the whole city thinking like children. Ye gods.

He was replaying the conversation with Vetinari in his head. There was something different about him, he was sure about it. For some reason, his mind kept trying to swivel back to the damned coffee. The way he’d run his thumb over his mouth… Well, it was a normal enough absent-minded gesture, but that in itself was the odd thing about it. By Vetinari’s standards, it was… Almost _intimate_. It couldn’t have been absent-minded, because it was _Vetinari_ , he never did anything absent-mindedly. And it had to mean something.

_Sodomy non sapiens_ , he thought, as the coach turned into Scoone Avenue. The sound of the wheels on the driveway, _his driveway_ , was like a punch to the stomach, the thought of seeing Sybil, and holding his son; all the emotion that had been building up was threatening to burst its banks; and it certainly wouldn’t ooze like the Ankh when it did. And Vetinari’s words were still echoing in his head: _We thought there was a good chance that you were going to die, Vimes_. It hadn’t really sunk in that it had been that bad until now. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, willing himself to find just a little more strength from somewhere deep down.

He got out of the coach and headed up the steps. He barely registered Wilikins opening the door for him as he stepped into the hall.

‘Sam?’

Sybil appeared in the hallway and before he knew it, her arms were wrapped around him. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his head resting on her shoulder, overwhelmed by the smell of home.

‘Oh, Sam,’ she said, pulling him closer.

—

The Watchhouse went quiet when Angua stepped inside that afternoon. Very quiet. Her face remained blank for a fraction of a second longer than would be considered comfortable, then she suddenly smiled very brightly. She got a few sheepish grins from some of the braver officers, the rest were suddenly bent over their reports or studiously inspecting the intricate patina of grime on their mugs.

‘Sergeant Colon?’ she said.

‘Yes, Acting Captain?’

Angua managed to resist the urge to roll her eyes at his use of the title. ‘A word, please?’

They climbed the stairs to Vimes’s office, both pretending not to hear the way the nervous chatter and little giggles broke out downstairs. Angua had even managed to make some headway with the paperwork, since the committee members of the Campaign for Equal Heights, the Silicon Anti-Defamation League, the League of Decency and other assorted headaches were all made up of the kind of people who had time on their hands. As such, they were also the kind of people who had been in a position to leave the city for the countryside as soon as the plague was starting to break out.

Where the piles of paper had been carefully deconstructed, there were rectangular patches on the rug that were brighter in colour and considerably less fluffy than the surrounding areas, and they’d even managed to excavate all of the mugs and plates from around the room.

‘I’ve just come from the palace. Commander Vimes is out of hospital,’ she said, carefully avoiding mentioning the fact that by now everyone knew that he’d run across the city half-naked, ‘And he’s recovering at home for a few days.’ She hesitated. ‘What are the odds?’ she said at last.

Colon’s big, round, already-red face screwed up into an expression of simultaneous confusion and cherubic innocence. ‘Odds, Acting Captain?’

‘Nobby’s running a book, isn’t he? He’s _always_ running a book.’ Angua prompted. When Colon didn’t respond, she sighed. ‘Come on, Fred, we’ve got to have one last bit of fun while the cat’s away. Just tell me what the odds are.’

Colon was practically squirming. ‘Well, Acting Captain,’ he said, wringing his hands, ‘He is running a book, but I don’t know what the odds are now… It’s all got a bit complicated, you see.’

‘Complicated? How?’

‘Well, he was taking bets on how many days it’d be before Commander Vimes was back at work, but everyone wanted to bet on it being tomorrow, y’see.’

Angua won a small prize for keeping a straight face as Colon continued.

‘So people are guessing to the nearest hour instead, so as he’s not bankrupted.’

‘I see,’ said Angua carefully. Again, she kept her face blank for a fraction of a second too long, before her face broke out into a conspiratorial smile. ‘Put me down for three dollars on, say, 11am will you, Fred?’

Colon’s face broke out into a huge grin and he saluted. ‘Yes, Acting Captain!’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's so late, this one wasn't easy to write for some reason! Feel free to bully me on Tumblr in future (@datsderbunnyblog)


	13. Do not, under any circumstances, whatever he says in there, go spare.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Vimes learns the truth, complicated Looks are exchanged, and Rufus Drumknott is worried

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry that this took so long! You may notice that I've changed the total number of chapters, I think I'm going to need an extra one to fit all the extra ideas in!

Vimes, once again, found himself sitting in the anteroom to the Oblong Office, wondering if it was possible to strangle a clock. He could smash it, of course, but as comforting as that thought was, it didn’t seem as satisfying as strangling it. Once again, Sybil’s very gentle words from earlier in the day were still ringing in his head, and it was taking all his self-control just to sit still.

Right, he thought. Do not, under any circumstances, whatever he says in there, go spare. Not at all. You promised Sybil that you’d stay calm.

‘You may go in now, Commander,’ said Drumknott.

_How does he know_? Vimes thought. There’s never any kind of signal from the office, no sound from the speaking tube, nothing. He got up stiffly and made his way to his usual spot opposite Vetinari’s desk. He saluted and said, ‘Sir.’

‘Ah, Commander Vimes. Do take a seat.’

Vimes considered his options here. It could go one of two ways, really. He could simply sit down now, or he could try to remain standing; and Vetinari’s little pauses, little looks and little remarks would just keep dripping away like water eroding stone, and he would end up giving in and sitting down anyway.

He stayed standing.

Vetinari continued writing. After a pause, without looking up from his work, he said, ‘We had an agreement, Commander. Three days.’

Vimes said nothing. His fists were balled by his sides, knuckles white.

‘And that,’ Vetinari continued, still writing, ‘Was already a compromise.’

‘Sir.’ Vimes didn’t point out that Vetinari himself had been on his deathbed even more times than Vimes had over the years, and that each time he was back at work within a couple of days. He stubbornly resisted the temptation.

Vetinari finished the sentence he was writing and finally looked up at Vimes, whose eyes were firmly fixed on the wall behind his head.

‘Well, I have to say that your timing is unusually good on this occasion. I’ve just received a report from the team at Unseen University. It seems that we have a viable vaccine.’

Vimes blinked, all thoughts of punching things suddenly derailed. ‘So soon?’

Vetinari nodded, with a genuine smile.

‘Indeed. It seems that young Ponder Stibbons came up with a way to accelerate the process, I think he said that their wretched thinking machine managed to drastically narrow down the number of possibilities they needed to try. He did try to explain it to me, but…’ Vetinari waved a hand vaguely, which was all the communication required between any two people that had, at one time or another, been subject to one of Ponder Stibbons’ explanations. ‘The point is that it _works_.’

Vimes nodded. ‘What next?’

Vetinari sighed. ‘Well, there is, of course, a limit to how quickly it can be manufactured. This plague is far from over, and it will be a long time indeed before we can even contemplate returning to normal city life, but the end is in sight. The next step is to prioritise how the supplies of the vaccine we have will initially be distributed.’

Vimes put his hand over his eyes. Countless problems arose in his vision, jostling for the top spot. One of the shoutiest problems, by some margin, was “what _The Times_ was going to print”, as ever; but there was some particularly aggressive elbow action from “how we’re going to stop people rioting when they hear about it, and spreading the disease even further in the process”.

Vetinari plucked a piece of paper from the pile in front of him with what was, in Vimes’s opinion, an unnecessary and slightly unfair amount of grace in such a simple action. He handed Vimes the list, gesturing to the chair with his chin.

Vimes sighed as he gave in and sat down, almost perching on the edge of the chair to pore over the list.

‘I have given it some thought, naturally, but I would appreciate your views on the matter. I intend to vaccinate our workforce first, which will, in turn, prevent transmission to their families. If you consider an outbreak on a factory line, for example, a group of, say, twenty men might all be exposed in the course of a day, and would then go on to infect their whole family, and suddenly twenty cases have become a hundred, and so on.

Vimes nodded again and scanned the list of occupations in neat, precise copperplate. Once he had ascertained that “Watchmen” were on the list, he turned his attention to making sure that nobody had been forgotten. Doctors, nurses, shopkeepers, dockers, artificers, coach drivers… The list went on. In short, all the people who had been coming into contact with a lot of people in order to keep the city alive.

‘I’d need some time to think about it, but this seems alright to me.’

The Patrician nodded and took the list back from Vimes. ‘All right then. Well, thank you, Commander,’ he said, gathering up the papers before him. ‘I’m certain that you’ll head home and get some rest now, as we agreed.’ His voice was suddenly spiky. ‘Don’t let me detain you.’

Vimes stood up and was about to salute, but he stopped himself. ‘No,’ he said, the word cutting through the otherwise silent room.

Vetinari looked up from his papers, eyebrow already raised. ‘No?’

‘No,’ said Vimes. ‘Not this time. Sybil told me what you did.’

Vetinari froze. Then he sat back in his chair with a deep breath. ‘Ah,’ he said, at last.

‘It’s true?’ Vimes couldn’t keep the horror out of his voice, part of him had still been certain, against all logic, that Sybil must have somehow got it wrong, or that he’d misunderstood, or _something_. ‘Have you lost your mind?’

The sudden hardening of the Patrician’s expression told Vimes that, however angry he was, this was not a question that he should ever ask of Vetinari like this. Not after Lord Snapcase. ‘What would have happened if you lost?’ he asked, fighting to keep his voice down.

‘I would have also died.’

Vimes stared at the man opposite him, and eventually realised that his mouth was slightly open. Again, the only thing he could think was: “are you insane?”, and although he could stop the words themselves from being said, he was certain that his face said it quite clearly nevertheless.

Vetinari simply held his gaze, and his face was giving absolutely nothing away. After a while, he sighed. ‘Do you think that I should have allowed you to die, Commander?’

‘Yes! Of course I do! Personal isn’t the same as important!’ Vimes didn’t know why that phrase had even presented itself for his attention, let alone how it had got through the filters in his mind and actually managed to get itself out into the open.

Vetinari tilted his head slightly. ‘No, it isn’t. It is not a choice I often find myself having to make, with good reason.’ He hesitated. ‘Have you ever thought about what that saying really means?’

Vimes endeavoured, quite effectively, by glare alone, to indicate that he had, and that he wouldn’t rise to any bloody stupid word games this time.

‘It always makes me slightly uneasy; you know,’ Vetinari continued, ‘It makes perfect sense on the surface, of course, but it is somewhat… Slippery. It almost implies that the two things; that is to say, the personal and the important; are mutually exclusive, which isn’t always the case, Commander.’ He shrugged. ‘After all, when faced with that very choice, Captain Carrot left the Watch to follow Sergeant Angua to Uberwald. The personal _was_ important.’

‘Oh, really?’ Vimes growled. ‘And you think you made the right choice, do you?’

A strange look crossed Vetinari’s face, and when he spoke again, his voice was no quieter, but it had lost some of its usual edge. ‘I still don’t know.’ Then, as quickly as it had come, the uncertainty was gone, and the effortless confidence of the Patrician was back. ‘I don’t know for certain what the outcome would have been for the city had I lost. In fact, I dare say that there were hundreds, or even thousands of possibilities. Equally, however, I don’t know what the outcome would have been had I done nothing and allowed you to die, Commander, although I am completely certain that you would have left a little boy and a grieving widow behind—’

‘Don’t you dare try to convince me that you did this for Sybil!’ Vimes roared.

Vetinari’s face didn’t change in the slightest. ‘I wasn’t suggesting that at all,’ he said, in the same level tone.

‘What exactly were you suggesting, then?’ Vimes was shouting at the top of his voice now, and he didn’t care whether Drumknott or anyone else heard him, because the dread was rising and he had the horrible feeling that, deep down, he knew the answer.

‘I don’t think that this is the time—’ Vetinari began.

Vimes walked around the desk in a couple of long strides and grabbed Vetinari by the front of his robes, hauling him out of the chair. ‘Just answer the question!’ 

It shouldn’t have presented a challenge to anyone educated at the Assassins’ Guild, let alone to Vetinari of all people, but the man simply raised both hands placatingly and awaited Vimes’s next move. He should have a blade at my throat by now, Vimes thought, or I should be lying unconscious on the floor, or _something_. I shouldn’t be able to do this, this isn’t right!

‘This is a conversation,’ Vetinari said slowly, ‘That I would prefer not to have like this.’

Vimes released his grip and turned away. ‘Ha! Really?’ He spun around again. ‘A candlelit dinner instead, perhaps?’

Vetinari’s eyes widened in what seemed to be genuine surprise. ‘You knew?’ he said, at last.

Not for certain, Vimes _didn’t_ say, not until a few seconds ago when your pupils dilated like that and your heart rate went through the roof. He was certain that even Vetinari couldn't fake _that_

Aloud, he said, ‘It’s true, then?’

Vetinari regarded Vimes for a moment, then he averted his gaze. ‘It has been brought to my attention that I might, indeed, have… _feelings_ for you.’ He said this as though he was trying to describe some kind of strange, unfamiliar taste in his mouth. Not an unpleasant taste, just unexpected. The word “feelings” was accompanied by an exasperated little flourish of the hands, and Vimes had never seen the man look so visibly uncomfortable before.

‘By who?’ asked Vimes, and he could just tell that Vetinari had bitten back the impulse to correct it to “whom”. The terror mounted once again; there was no answer to that question that would make the situation any better, but there was one that would make things even worse, and this just happened to be the inevitable one.

After what felt like an eternity, he replied, ‘Lady Sybil.’ 

And there it was.

‘No. No!’ Vimes started to back away, then he turned his back on Vetinari, his head in his hands. He spun around again. ‘Stay away from me, and stay away from Sybil!’ said Vimes.

‘I think Sybil can make up her own mind—’ Vetinari began.

‘No!’ Vimes snapped. ‘I don’t want you anywhere near her! I don’t trust you as far as I can throw you!’

Vetinari glanced towards the window, and Vimes could just see the words that were shaping up. The Look he gave Vimes next said: I’m very carefully not saying that you could, in fact, throw me quite a long way if you really put your mind to it.

It was a complicated Look, as Looks go.

‘Stay away!’ Vimes repeated, then he turned on his heel and left without another word.

—

Drumknott heard the distant shouts coming from upstairs, and almost dropped his teacup into its saucer. He shouted his thanks to the housekeeper over his shoulder as he hurried towards the stairs; he’d thought it would be safest to take his tea during Commander Vimes’s appointment, but this didn’t sound like the normal kind of shouting he’d expect.

On the second-floor landing, he almost ran into Vimes, who didn’t even acknowledge him as he stormed past. It wasn’t often that Rufus Drumknott wished he was the kind of person who might fall back on swearing, but at times like these, he was almost tempted to try. It wasn’t that he thought the Commander might have hurt his lordship, but he had a bad feeling about it all the same.

At last, he came to the door of the Oblong Office. He knocked and waited.

‘Come in,’ came the reply, to his immense relief.

He opened the door soundlessly. Vetinari was standing at the window, looking out over the city.

‘Is everything alright, my lord?’ he asked, fighting for control of his breathing and his voice. ‘I heard raised voices. I’m so sorry, I was downstairs taking my tea break.’

Vetinari didn’t turn around, but that wasn’t necessarily unusual, Drumknott reminded himself. ‘I’m quite alright, thank you, Drumknott,’ he said. He sounded slightly distant, as though lost in thought.

Drumknott nodded to himself, then he set about rearranging the papers on the desk and preparing for the next meeting. He was about to open the door again, but he stopped himself and turned around, taking a deep breath.

‘Sergeant Detritus won the wager, my lord,’ he said, quietly, ‘At the Watch House, I mean.’

Vetinari turned around. He gave Drumknott a little smile, but there was something slightly sad about it. ‘Really? I’m surprised at Corporal Nobbs’s judgement, taking Sergeant Detritus’s bet in this weather. Why, the winter solstice is almost upon us.’

Drumknott nodded. ‘Yes, my lord, but Sergeant Detritus _had_ just caught him with his hand actually inside the petty cash tin. I gather that he didn't have much choice in the matter.’

Vetinari’s smile didn’t get any wider, but there was just a little more warmth behind it. ‘Thank you, Drumknott,’ he said. He drew himself up a little more, setting his face into a neutral, but amiable expression. ‘Now, then, remind me, which meeting is next?’

‘ _The Times_ , my lord.’

‘Delightful.’

—

Vimes’s feet took him away from the Palace. Instead of the familiar route across the Brass Bridge towards Pseudopolis Yard, or across Maudlin Bridge to Scoone Avenue, they took him around the winding river, across to Easy Street, then cut through Cable Street and finally to Treacle Mine Road, where the building work at the Watch House stood abandoned.

Of course, he wasn’t completely free of Vetinari here either, since he was the one who’d initiated the restoration work in the first place, but if Vimes had one place in the city that felt almost sacred to him, it was here. It was where his career began all those years ago, it had seen him through his rock-bottom, it had been destroyed by the dragon that had woken him up and prompted his renaissance. And now, here it was, its resurrection put on hold thanks to the plague, like so many other things.

Vimes glanced around behind him and gave the door a discreet but firm nudge with his shoulder to let himself into the building. Once inside, he lit a cigar and leaned against the wall. The familiar ritual of lighting the cigar, as well as the knowledge that he shouldn’t really be smoking at all, were of some comfort as the rage slowly began to subside and he tried to unravel some of his thoughts. He didn’t even know where to begin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you once again for your patience and especially to those of you who have been encouraging me on Tumblr/Discord. I really do appreciate it, PLEASE keep leaving feedback and nagging me on whatever platform you prefer!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, glad you've made it this far! I'd love to hear as much feedback as possible!


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